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HI 


PETRARCH 


PETRARCH 

FROM    A   Cill'Y    r,Y    MK'i.    ARTHUR    LEMOX    OK    THE    rORTRAIT    IX    THE    LAURENTIAN    LIBRARY, 

FLORENCE 


PETRARCH 

HIS    LIFE   AND  TIMES 


BY 


H.    C.    tJOLLWAY-CALTHROP 

LATB  OF  BALLIOL  COLLEGE,  OXFORD 
BURSAR  OF  ETON  COLLEGE 


WITH    TWENTY-FOUR    ILLUSTRATIONS 


New  York  :  G.   P.   PUTNAM'S  SONS 

London:    METHUEN    &    CO. 

1907 


TO 

WILHELMINA 

MY    WIFE 

The  publican,  that  man  of  sin, 
To  lure  confiding  drinkers  in 
And  advertise  his  beer  and  wine, 
Over  his  door  displays  a  sign  : 

So  to  get  readers  for  my  book 

And  tempt  them  in  its  leaves  to  look, 

I  at  its  front  and  entry  frame 

A  lure,  the  best  I  know — your  name. 


PREFACE 

IN  a  short  Life  of  Petrarch,  which  aims  at  in- 
teresting the  reader  in  fourteenth-century  history, 
and  in  one  of  its  most  fascinating  personaHties, 
there  can  be  no  room  for  the  elaborate  discussion 
of  chronological  and  other  "  cruces."  Students  of 
the  period  know  only  too  well  how  many,  how 
intricate,  and  how  exasperating  these  difficulties 
are  ;  happily  they  are  hardly  ever  of  first-rate  im- 
portance. In  these  pages  I  have  done  my  best  to 
ensure  accuracy,  and  in  no  case  have  I  put  forward 
a  statement  without  careful  consideration  of  the 
evidence ;  but  in  no  case,  either,  has  space  per- 
mitted me  to  orive  a  full  dio-est  of  such  evidence. 
In  trivial  matters  I  have  simply  stated  what  seems 
to  me  the  most  probable  version  of  the  facts  :  in 
questions  of  more  moment  I  have  indicated  the 
existence  of  a  doubt  and  of  possible  alternative 
solutions.  Usually,  but  not  always,  I  have  followed 
Fracassetti,  to  whom  all  students  of  Petrarch  and 
his  times  owe  a  debt  of  deepest  gratitude. 

It  is  equally  impossible  within  the  limits  of  a 
Preface  to  orive  a  list  of  the  authorities  on  which 
any  life  of  Petrarch  must  be  based.  Anyone  who 
wishes  to  pursue  the  subject  further  may  be  referred 


viii      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

to  the  first  chapter  of  Dr.  Koerting's  Petrarcas 
Leben  und  Werke  (Leipzig,  1878),  where  he  will 
find  an  admirable  digest  of  the  chief  materials  avail- 
able to  that  date  ;  a  foreign  bookseller  will  keep 
him  informed  as  to  later  publications.  Here  I  may 
just  mention  that  de  Sade,  Baldelli,  Domenico  Ros- 
setti,  Fracassetti,  and  Dr.  Koerting  are  the  modern 
writers  to  whom  my  obligations  are  greatest. 

After  all,  however,  Petrarch  himself  is  far  and 
away  the  most  important  authority  for  his  own 
biography  ;  the  following  narrative  is  substantially 
taken  from  his  writings,  and  I  think  there  are  very 
few  statements  in  it  which  do  not  find  valid  support 
— I  dare  not  say  complete  proof — there. 

My  cordial  thanks  for  helpful  correspondence  are 
due  to  Mr.  Lionel  Cust,  to  the  Rev.  E.  H.  R. 
Tatham,  to  Dr.  Paget  Toynbee  and,  above  all,  to 
Professor  Ker,  who  has  constantly  encouraged  my 
work  on  Petrarch,  and  has  given  this  book  the  in- 
estimable benefit  of  his  supervision. 

Equally  cordial  are  my  thanks  to  three  younger 
friends,  Mr.  D.  Home  of  Christ's  College,  Mr.  F.  W. 
Hunt  of  Oriel,  and  Mr.  Dennis  Robertson,  k.s.,  of 
Eton,  for  the  unstinted  help  with  which  they  have 
supplemented  the  deficiencies  of  my  eyesight  by 
writing  my  MS.,  verifying  my  references,  and  cor- 
recting my  proofs. 

H.  C  H.-C. 

Eton  College 

May,  igoy 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER    I 

PAGE 

Early  Years,  1304-13 26  .  .  .         .         i 

CHAPTER   II 
Avignon  and  Laura,  1326-1329  .  .         .       26 

CHAPTER   III 

Travel  and  Friendship,  1329-1336  .  .         .       43 

CHAPTER   IV 

Rome  and  Vaucluse,  i 336-1 340  .  .         -72 

CHAPTER  V 
The  Crown  of  Song,  i 340-1 341  .  .        .92 

CHAPTER  VI 
Parma,  Naples,  and  Vaucluse,  i 341-1347  .         .     102 

CHAPTER   VII 

Rome  and  Rienzi,  1347  .  .  .         .122 

CHAPTER   VIII 

The  Great  Plague  and  the  Death  of  Laura,  1348- 

1349        .  .  .  ...     135 

CHAPTER   IX 

Florence  and  Boccaccio,  1350  .  .        .146 


X         PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

CHAPTER   X 
Vaucluse,  1351-1353    •  •  .  •         •     155 


PAGE 


CHAPTER   XI 
Milan  and  the  Visconti,   i 353-1354         •  •         -174 

CHAPTER   Xn 
Charles  IV  and  Prague,  i 354-1 357         .  .         .187 

CHAPTER  XIII 

DOMESTICA,    I357-1360  .  .  ...       201 

CHAPTER   XIV 

The  Founder  of  Humanism — Petrarch's  Work-;" and 

ITS  Result  .  .  .  .         .     215 

CHAPTER   XV 

The  Sorrowful  Years  of  the  Second  Plague — Deaths 

of  Friends,  1360-1363         .  ...     230 

CHAPTER  XVI 

The   Master  and    his    Pupils — Venice,    Padua,   and 

Pavia,   1 364-1 36 7   .  .  .  .         .     244 

CHAPTER   XVII 
The  Pope  in  Rome,  1367-1370  .  ...     270 

CHAPTER   XVIII 
The  Last  Years,  1370-1374        .  ...     285 

CHAPTER  XIX 
Conclusion  and  Summary  .  ...     303 

Index  .  .  .  ...     309 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


Petrarch  ;    from    a   copy   by   Mrs.   Arthur    Lemon    of   the 

PORTRAIT   IN   THE   LaURENTIAN   LIBRARY,    FLORENCE  Frontispiece 


FACING  PAGE 

21 


View  of  Bologna  .... 

View  of  Avignon  .  .  ... 

Laura;  from  a  copy  by  Mrs.  Arthur  Lemon  of  the  portrait 

in  the  Laurentian  Library,  Florence 
The  Palace  of  the  Popes,  Avignon  .  ... 

The  Monument  of  Pope  John  XXII,  Avignon 
The  Tombs  of  the  Scaligeri,  Verona       .  ... 

The  Monument  of  King  Robert  of  Naples 
Pope  Clement  VI;  from  a  portrait  in  ihe  British  Museum     107 
View    of    Vaucluse    and    the    Castle    of    the    Bishop    of 

Cavaillon  ..... 
rienzi  ;  from  an  italian  print  . 
Laura;  from  a  print  in  the  Paduan    1819  edition  of  the 

Canzoniere  .... 

Boccaccio;  from  a  portrait  in  the  British  Museum 
The   Tomb  of  Jacopo  II   da  Carrara,   with   inscription   by 

Petrarch     ..... 

Vaucluse;  the  Sorgue  and  Petrarch's  Garden    . 
The  Equestrian  Statue  of  Bernabo  Visconti 


The  Tomb  of  Andrea  Dandolo,  with  inscription  by  Petrarch     1S4 

Innocent  VI;  from  a  portrait  in  the  British  Museum 

The  Tomb  of  Niccolo  Acciaiuoli 

Petrarch's  House  in  Venice 

The  Castle  of  Pavia      .... 

Urban  V;  from  a  portrait  in  the  British  Museum 

Petrarch's  House  at  Arqu.\ 

Petrarch's  Tomb  .... 


119 

I2S 

148 


154 
163 

178 


204 
214 
241 

253 

272 
288 
303 


PETRARCH  AND  HIS  TIMES 


CHAPTER    I 

EARLY    YEARS 
1304-1326 

FRANCESCO  PETRARCA,  better  known  to 
English-speaking  readers  as  Petrarch,  was  a 
wanderer  from  his  birth.  Owing  to  his  father's 
banishment  from  Florence,  he  was  "begotten  and 
born  in  exile  "  ;  and  throughout  the  seventy  years 
of  his  life  he  never  continued  long  in  one  stay. 
But  the  habitual  stir  and  bustle  of  his  existence 
contrast  strongly  with  the  quiet  of  some  of  its 
interludes.  Few  men  can  ever  have  had  a  more 
varied  experience  or  a  wider  range  of  interests  than 
this  restless  traveller,  the  companion  of  cardinals 
and  princes,  the  friend  of  great  statesmen,  the  am- 
bassador from  the  Lords  of  Milan  to  an  Emperor, 
who  was  also  the  hermit  of  Vaucluse,  the  poet  of 
Laura,  the  lover  of  country  life  known  to  a  circle 
of  devoted  friends  as  "  Silvanus,"  the  indefatigable 
student,  the  great  scholar  to  whom,  more  than  to 
any  other  man,  we  owe  the  Revival  of  Learning  in 
Europe.  His  character  was  as  rich  in  variety  as 
the  circumstances  of  his  life.     He  cherished  great 


2  PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

ideals,  and  did  more  than  a  man  may  well  dare  to 
hope  towards  their  realisation  ;  but  he  often  erred 
in  his  application  of  them  to  the  problems  of  prac- 
tical life.  Intellectually  the  most  gifted  man  of  his 
age,  he  rendered  incalculable  service  to  the  mental 
development  of  mankind ;  but  he  occasionally  wasted 
his  brilliant  talent  in  trivial  and  unworthy  con- 
troversy. Fervent  in  piety,  enthusiastic  in  friend- 
ship and  in  the  pursuit  of  noble  aims,  he  was  not 
exempt  from  frailty,  while  the  ardour  of  his  tem- 
perament explains,  and  may  be  held  to  excuse,  a 
certain  want  of  balance  in  his  character.  We  see 
in  him  no  mirror  of  perfection,  but  a  man  of  high 
virtues  and  splendid  gifts,  of  quick  human  sym- 
pathies and  impulses,  of  a  self-questioning  spirit 
not  at  unity  with  itself,  of  provoking  but  not  ignoble 
foibles,  a  man  to  admire,  to  pity,  sometimes  to 
quarrel  with,  to  love  always. 

Petrarch  came  of  an  ancient  and  honourable,  but 
not  a  noble,  family.  For  three  generations  at  least 
his  ancestors  had  been  Notaries  in  the  city  of 
Florence.  His  great-grandfather,  Ser  Garzo,  was 
a  man  of  saintly  life  and  great  repute  for  wisdom, 
the  counsellor  and  referee  not  only  of  neighbours 
and  intimate  friends,  but  of  politicians  and  men  of 
letters.  He  lived  to  the  age  of  104,  and  died  at 
last  on  his  birthday  in  the  same  room  in  which  he 
had  been  born.  His  son,  Ser  Parenzo,  seems  to 
have  maintained  the  honourable  traditions  of  the 
family  without  adding  to  its  distinction  ;  but  his  son 
again,  Ser  Petracco,  the  father  of  Petrarch,  was 
a  man  of  extraordinary  talent,  combining  a  refined 


EARLY   YEARS  3 

taste  in  literature  with  ability  of  the  highest  order 
in  the  hereditary  profession  of  the  law.  I5orn  prob- 
ably in  1267,  he  rose  rapidly  in  the  service  of  the 
State,  and  before  he  was  thirty-five  years  of  ac^e 
had  held  many  important  public  positions ;  for 
instance,  he  was  Chancellor  of  the  Commission  for 
Reforms,  and  in  1301  was  a  member  of  an  impor- 
tant embassy  to  Pisa. 

The  highest  dignities  of  the  State  seemed  to  lie 
within  the  reasonable  compass  of  his  ambition,  and 
it  must  have  been  about  this  time  that  the  happy 
prospects  of  his  life  were  crowned  by  his  marriage 
with  the  young  and  charming  Eletta  Canigiani. 
But  in  the  year  1302  he  was  arraigned  before  a 
criminal  court  on  a  trumped-up  charge  of  having 
falsified  a  legal  document,  convicted  in  his  absence, 
and  sentenced  to  a  fine  of  1000  lire  or  the  loss  of 
his  right  hand.  Banishment  and  the  confiscation 
of  his  property  were  the  result  of  his  refusal  to  sur- 
render and  take  his  sentence.  Every  one  knew 
that  the  charge  was  false,  a  pretext  devised  to  give 
some  colour  of  justification  to  the  banishment  of  a 
political  opponent,  and  that  his  real  offence  con- 
sisted in  his  adhesion  to  the  party  of  the  "  White 
Guelfs,"  of  which  the  poet  Dante  was  the  most 
illustrious  member. 

The  cross-currents  of  mediaeval  politics  in  Italy 
are  numberless,  and  it  is  hard  to  steer  an  intelligible 
course  among  them ;  every  rule  had  almost  as  many 
exceptions  as  examples,  and  every  principle  was 
liable  to  violation  to  suit  the  convenience  of  its 
nominal  upholders.     But  speaking  broadly,  it  may 


4  PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

be  said  that  the  Guelf  championed  civic  indepen- 
dence under  the  hegemony  of  the  Papacy,  the 
GhibelHn  personal  government  under  the  sove- 
reignty of  the  Emperor.  How  far  either  Pope  or 
Emperor  exercised  an  effective  control  within  his 
own  party  depended  mainly  on  his  personal 
character  and  that  of  those  with  whom  he  had 
to  deal ;  the  Angevin  Kings  of  Naples  and  the 
Republic  of  Florence  were  often  more  powerful 
than  the  Pope,  while  on  the  Ghibellin  side  the 
great  Lords  of  Lombardy  habitually  acted  as  in- 
dependent princes,  and  scarcely  pretended  to  give 
more  than  a  nominal  allegiance  to  the  successors 
of  Frederick  II. 

In  Florence  the  Guelf  party  had  ruled  supreme 
for  nearly  forty  years,  and  the  political  struggle 
centred  upon  the  efforts  of  the  people  to  limit  the 
authority  of  the  nobles.  Suddenly  the  Guelf  party 
was  rent  in  twain  by  a  feud  which  began,  much  as 
our  own  Wars  of  the  Roses  are  said  to  have  begun, 
in  a  domestic  brawl.  The  feud  spread  from  Pistoia, 
the  city  of  its  origin,  to  Florence,  where  the  nobles, 
seeing  in  it  a  chance  of  regaining  the  power  and 
privileges  recently  taken  from  them,  espoused  the 
quarrel  of  the  "  Blacks,"  or  extreme  Guelfs,  and 
accused  the  *'  Whites,"  the  more  moderate  faction, 
of  endangering  the  safety  of  the  State  by  encourag- 
ing Ghibellinism.  With  Florence  thus  divided 
against  herself,  the  right  arm  of  the  Church  was 
paralysed,  a  state  of  things  so  serious  that  even 
Pope  Boniface  VIII  was  for  once  in  his  life  dis- 
posed to  moderate  counsels,  and  nominated  Charles 


EARLY   YEARS  5 

of  Valois,  brother  of  the  King  of  France  and  cousin 
of  the  King  of  Naples,  to  act  as  mediator  between 
the  factions.  There  were  old  ties  of  friendship  and 
alliance  between  the  Royal  House  of  France  and 
the  Republic  of  Florence,  and  the  great  body  of  the 
people  gladly  welcomed  the  Prince,  who  swore  to 
respect  their  laws  and  liberties,  and  to  deal  justly 
with  all  parties.  By  these  promises  he  gained  ad- 
mission to  the  city,  into  which  he  made  his  solemn 
entry  on  All  Souls'  Day,  1301.  But  he  was  no 
sooner  within  the  walls  than  he  shamelessly  violated 
all  his  pledges,  set  at  naught  the  Constitution  of  the 
State,  and  openly  encouraged  the  "  Black  "  faction 
to  murder  and  rob  their  principal  opponents.  For 
the  violence  of  the  "Black"  Guelfs  some  excuse 
may  be  found  ;  Florence  was  surrounded  by  bitter 
enemies,  and  the  honest  men  of  the  party  may 
really  have  thought  that  the  "  Whites  "  had  been 
guilty  of  disloyalty  to  the  Guelf  cause,  or  of  weak- 
ness in  serving  it,  while  the  nobles  had  been  ex- 
asperated by  special  legislation  directed  against 
their  order,  and  could  hardly  be  expected  to  forego 
an  opportunity  of  revenge.  But  for  Charles  no 
shadow  of  justification  can  be  pleaded ;  he  was 
false  to  his  commission,  false  to  his  plighted  word, 
false  to  the  people  who  trusted  him.  His  conduct 
ranks  among  the  meanest  betrayals  which  history 
records. 

It  was  probably  at  this  time  that  Ser  Petracco 
was  forced  to  leave  the  city,  though  formal  pro- 
ceedings were  not  taken  against  him  till  many 
months  later,  and  the  date  of  his  "  trial  "  and  con- 


6  PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

demnation  is  October  2nd,  1302.  His  young  wife 
went  with  him  into  banishment,  and  they  found  a 
refuge,  together  with  many  of  their  friends  and 
fellow-exiles,  in  the  Ghibellin  city  of  Arezzo,  a 
retreat  especially  convenient  to  Petracco,  as  his 
hereditary  property  at  Incisa  lay  on  the  direct 
road  to  Florence,  and  only  twelve  miles  across  the 
State  boundary. 

In  1303  he  returned  for  a  few  weeks  to  Florence 
as  ambassador  for  his  party.  Boniface  VIII  was 
dead,  and  Benedict  XI  made  another  attempt  at 
reconciling  the  Guelf  factions.  With  this  object  he 
sent  as  Legate  to  Tuscany  the  Cardinal  Niccolo  da 
Prato,  an  honest  man  zealous  for  peace.  On  May 
loth,  1303,  the  Florentines  received  the  Cardinal 
with  open  arms,  gave  him  the  temporary  govern- 
ment of  the  city,  and  elected  Priors  devoted  to  his 
interests,  who  issued  safe-conducts  to  the  envoys  of 
the  White  Guelfs. 

All  promised  well ;  the  people  were  earnest  for 
peace,  the  Cardinal  was  benevolent  and  sincere ; 
the  "  White"  envoys  seem  to  have  been  reasonable 
in  their  demands.  But  the  "Black"  extremists 
were  resolved  to  prevent  a  peace  which  would  ruin 
their  supremacy  in  the  State,  and  they  shrank  from 
nothing  that  might  serve  their  object.  By  a  clever 
forgery  of  the  Cardinal's  hand  and  seal,  they  per- 
suaded the  people  that  he  was  summoning  a  Ghi- 
bellin army  to  Florence ;  the  negotiations  were 
broken  off;  the  envoys  returned  to  report  their 
failure  to  their  friends,  and  the  Cardinal,  suspected 
by  every  one  except  those  who  had  brought  him 


EARLY   YEARS  7 

into  suspicion,  retired  to  his  native  Prato,  and  laid 
the  territory  of  Florence  under  an  interdict. 

Peaceful  means  having  failed,  the  "Whites"  re- 
solved on  an  attempt  to  redress  their  grievances 
by  force.  The  Cardinal,  in  an  evil  hour  for  his 
reputation  as  a  statesman,  encouraged  them  in 
their  design,  and  so  played  into  the  hands  of 
the  "  Blacks "  and  confirmed  the  bulk  of  the 
people  in  their  suspicions  of  him.  Acting  on  his 
suggestion,  the  exiles  mustered  their  forces  and 
appeared  before  the  walls  of  Florence  on  the 
morning  of  July  20th,  1304.  But  scattered  as  they 
had  been  among  the  cities  of  Tuscany  and  the 
Emilia,  concerted  action  was  difficult  and  secrecy 
impossible  ;  some  of  their  contingents  arrived  too 
late ;  they  found  their  enemies  forewarned ;  and 
after  some  fruitless  skirmishing  they  were  forced 
to  retreat  and  disperse. 

We  do  not  know  whether  Petracco,  who  had 
played  so  prominent  a  part  in  the  peace  negotia- 
tions, shared  the  responsibility  for  this  ill-judged 
and  ill-executed  appeal  to  arms  ;  but  he  probably 
shared  its  dangers,  and  if  so,  he  was  away  from 
home  when  his  eldest  son  was  born.  "  On  Mon- 
day, July  20th,  1304,"  Petrarch  tells  us  in  one  of 
his  letters,  "  the  very  day  on  which  the  exiles  were 
beaten  back  from  the  walls  of  Florence,  just  as  the 
dawn  began  to  brighten,  I  was  born  in  the  city  of 
Arezzo,  in  Garden  Street  as  it  is  called,  with  such 
travail  of  my  mother  and  at  such  peril  of  her  life, 
that  not  only  the  midwives,  but  even  the  physicians 
believed  for  some  time  that  she  was  dead."     The 


8         PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

street  still  keeps  its  old  name  of  Vicolo  dell'  Orto ; 
the  house  which  first  sheltered  the  poet  of  Laura 
and  founder  of  Humanism  still  stands,  and  now  bears 
on  its  walls  a  marble  tablet  inscribed  with  Petrarch's 
name,  with  three  passages  from  his  writings  in 
which  he  speaks  of  his  birthplace,  and  with  an 
attestation  of  the  transfer  of  the  house  in  1810  from 
private  to  public  ownership.  The  city  has  always 
been  proud  of  her  accidental  connection  with 
Petrarch,  and  he  for  his  part  was  equally  proud  of 
her  as  his  birthplace.  "  Arezzo,"  he  declared  to  an 
Aretine  friend,  "has  been  far  more  generous  to  an 
alien  in  blood  than  has  Florence  to  her  own  son." 
And  more  than  four  centuries  after  his  death 
Arezzo  reaped  a  rich  reward  for  her  hospitality  to 
his  parents,  when  Napoleon  after  Marengo,  out  of 
reverence  for  the  memory  of  Petrarch,  exacted  no 
penalty  for  the  stubborn  resistance  of  the  Aretines. 
Intimately  as  his  name  has  been  associated  with 
that  of  Arezzo  in  the  imagination  of  posterity,  he 
spent  there  only  the  first  six  months  of  his  life.  In 
February,  1305,  Eletta  left  Arezzo  with  her  little 
son,  and  went  to  live  on  Petracco's  hereditary 
property  at  Incisa.  On  the  way  the  future  poet 
had  a  narrow  escape  from  drowning :  he  was 
carried  "on  the  arm  of  a  strong  young  fellow,  as 
Metabus  carried  Camilla,  wrapped  in  a  linen  cloth 
and  slung  from  a  knotted  staff.  While  crossing  the 
Arno,  the  young  man  was  thrown  by  a  stumble  of 
his  horse,  emd  nearly  perished  in  the  rushing  stream 
through  his  efforts  to  save  the  burden  entrusted  to 
him."     No    harm    came  of  the  accident,   and    the 


EARLY   YEARS  9 

party  arrived  safely  at  Incisa,  where  Petrarch  was 
to  spend  the  next  seven  years  of  his  Hfe. 

Somehow  or  other  this  little  country  estate  had 
escaped  the  decree  of  confiscation  which  deprived 
Ser  Petracco  of  the  rest  of  his  property.  The 
obvious  theory  that  it  belonged  to  Eletta's  family 
and  not  to  her  husband's  is  disproved  by  docu- 
ments ;  probably,  therefore,  Petracco  was  not  its 
sole  owner ;  he  may  have  held  it  jointly  with  other 
relatives,  or  it  may  have  been  settled  on  his  wife  in 
return  for  the  dowry  which  she  brought  him.  What- 
ever the  explanation,  Eletta  was  able  to  live  there 
unmolested,  and  Petracco,  though  banished  and  pro- 
scribed, could  easily  visit  her  by  stealth.  The  rulers 
of  a  mediaeval  State  cared  chiefly  about  its  cities 
and  fortified  places  ;  so  long  as  there  were  no  con- 
spiracies hatching,  they  would  not  be  over-active  in 
policing  a  little  country  village.  Moreover,  the 
great  range  of  the  Prato  Magno,  at  the  foot  of 
which  Incisa  lies,  offers  many  a  lonely  sheep-track 
by  which  an  exile  might  travel  unsuspected,  and 
many  a  wooded  nook  where,  sheltered  by  friends, 
he  might  find  a  hiding-place  from  any  casual  search- 
party.  Petracco  certainly  did  contrive  to  visit  his 
wife,  and  in  1307  their  second  son,  Gherardo,  was 
born  ;  a  third  boy,  who  died  in  infancy,  must  have 
been  born  much  later,  though  the  local  inscriptions 
at  Incisa  claim  him  too  as  a  native  of  the  place,  for 
Petrarch  retained  a  vivid  recollection  of  his  love  for 
this  baby-brother  and  of  his  poignant  sorrow  at  the 
child's  death. 

We  have  no  details  of  the  life  at  Incisa  ;  but  any 


lo       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

one  who  has  lived  the  year  through  in  Tuscany 
can  imagine  them  for  himself,  for  the  essential 
features  of  Tuscan  life  are  as  little  changed  as  the 
scenery  itself  You  may  search  Europe  from  end 
to  end  and  find  no  more  ideal  spot  than  Incisa  for 
a  poet's  upbringing.  It  is  a  bright  little  township 
on  the  left  bank  of  the  Arno,  deriving  its  name  from 
the  ororo-e  or  cuttingr  which  the  river  has  here  made 

o        o  o 

for  itself  through  the  rock.  To  the  west  are  steep 
round-topped  hills  rich  with  vegetation  ;  to  the  east 
a  lovely  maze  of  low  ridge  and  fertile  valley  lies 
between  the  channel  of  the  Arno  and  the  massive 
range  of  the  Prato  Magno.  Then,  as  now,  the 
corn  grew  between  rows  of  pollards,  mostly  maple, 
over  which  twined  the  stems  and  tendrils  of  the 
vines ;  then,  as  now,  you  might  see  by  the  summer 
moonlight,  after  the  corn  was  reaped,  the  white  or 
fawn-coloured  oxen  moving  slowly  between  the 
trees,  dragging  through  the  stubble  such  a  plough 
as  that  of  which  Cincinnatus  held  the  stilts. 
Mingled  with  the  vineyards  are  groves  of  olives ; 
above  them  on  the  slopes  of  the  mountain  grow  the 
chestnuts,  the  meal  of  which  is  a  staple  food  of  the 
country-folk ;  higher  yet  is  a  belt  of  pines  and 
beeches  ;  and  above  all  the  immense  expanse  of 
short,  crisp  grass,  sweet  to  crop  and  elastic  to  tread, 
from  which  the  rancre  takes  its  name  of  "the  Great 
Meadow."  The  passion  for  Nature,  which  dis- 
tinguishes Petrarch  from  his  predecessors,  was 
surely  first  aroused  in  him  by  the  beauty  of  his 
childhood's  home. 

Nor  was   this    his  only  debt   to   Incisa.     From 


EARLY   YEARS  ii 

every  peasant  he  would  hear  those  Tuscan  songs 
which  are  distinguished  above  all  popular  poetry 
by  grace  of  imagery  and  refinement  of  diction  ;  his 
quick,  impressionable  brain  would  receive  from  them 
its  first  idea  of  poetic  expression  ;  here  surely  was 
the  origin  of  that  Italian  spirit  which  in  later  years 
he  breathed  into  the  courtly  forms  of  the  Provengal 
lyric.  A  tablet  marks  the  house,  still  standing  on 
the  steep  hillside  amid  the  ruins  of  an  ancient  castle, 
which  tradition  assio-ns  as  the  home  of  Eletta  and 
her  children  ;  another  tablet  of  very  recent  erection 
on  the  litde  town  hall  commemorates  Petrarch's 
connection  with  the  place ;  it  is  a  sound  instinct 
which  has  led  the  composers  of  both  inscriptions 
to  emphasise  the  fact  that  here  the  future  poet's 
childish  lips  first  opened  to  the  sweet  accents  of  his 
mother-speech. 

The  current  of  Italian  politics  had  borne  him  as 
a  baby  to  Incisa  ;  the  same  stormy  current  swept 
him  out  of  this  quiet  home  seven  years  later,  and 
carried  him  to  have  his  first  glimpse  of  the  great 
world  at  Pisa.  Henry  of  Luxemburg  had  been 
elected  Kingr  of  the  Romans  with  the  full  consent 
of  Pope  Clement  V,  if  not  actually  at  his  sugges- 
tion ;  for  the  first  time  it  seemed  as  if  Emperor  and 
Pope  might  work  heartily  together  to  reconcile  the 
Italian  factions.  Never  was  man  so  well  fitted  as 
Henry  for  this  honourable  task.  Men  said  of  him 
that  he  was  neither  puffed  up  by  victory  nor  cast 
down  by  defeat ;  among  the  petty  intrigues  of 
German  princes  and  Italian  despots  he  walked 
serene,  intent  upon  justice,  so  that  he  did  indeed 


12        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

deserve  the  magnificent  eulogy  of  Dante,  who  as- 
signed a  seat  in  the  highest  heaven,  in  the  very- 
Rose  of  the  Blessed,  to  "the  lofty  Henry,  who 
should  come  to  guide  Italy  aright  before  she  was 
ready."  He  failed,  but  his  failure  was  more  glorious 
than  the  successes  of  meaner  men.  In  the  spring 
of  131 2,  however,  when  he  marched  through  Lom- 
bardy  into  Tuscany,  the  hopes  of  his  friends  ran 
high.  The  Pope,  though  notoriously  capable  of 
treachery,  had  not  yet  declared  himself  a  traitor  to 
the  Emperor  of  his  choice,  and  if  the  Caesar's 
authority  were  backed  by  the  Pope,  Guelf  and  Ghi- 
bellin  alike  might  be  expected  to  bow  before  it. 
The  prospect  was  still  fair  when  Henry  took  up 
his  quarters  in  Pisa,  a  stronghold  of  Ghibellin- 
ism  loyal  through  all  vicissitudes  to  its  noblest 
champion.  Hither  came  Ser  Petracco,  with  many 
of  his  political  friends,  to  meet  the  Emperor,  and 
hither,  finding  himself  at  last  in  a  place  of  safety, 
he  summoned  his  wife  and  children  to  join  him. 
So  it  was  in  Pisa  that  the  little  Petrarch  first  beheld 
the  glories  of  a  rich  and  artistic  Italian  city,  at  this 
time  the  rival  of  Florence  herself  in  the  beauty  of 
her  buildings.  The  cathedral  and  the  baptistery 
stood  then  as  we  see  them  to-day,  only  the  bronze 
doors  and  a  few  decorative  details  remaining  to  be 
added  at  a  later  date  ;  the  leaning  tower  wanted 
only  the  topmost  tier  of  its  arches ;  the  cloister  of 
the  Campo  Santo  was  built,  and  the  best  artists  of 
Tuscany  had  begun  to  cover  its  walls  with  frescoes 
of  the  rarest  beauty.  By  the  Arno  stood  the  little 
fishermen's  chapel  of  the  Spina,  a  gem  in  marble, 


EARLY   YEARS  13 

finished  only  a  year  or  two  before,  and  the  quays 
on  either  side  were  Hned  with  a  stately  row  of 
palaces  which  Venice  herself  could  not  surpass  for 
many  a  day  to  come.  To  a  quick-witted  child  of 
precocious  resthetic  sense  Pisa  must  have  seemed  a 
city  of  fairyland. 

He  stayed  about  a  year  within  her  walls,  till  the 
defeat  of  Henry  VH  quenched  the  last  spark  of 
genuine  Imperialist  enthusiasm  in  Italy.  Henry 
had  been  crowned  in  Rome,  but  in  other  respects 
his  expedition  ended  in  failure.  The  Pope  played 
him  false ;  Naples  and  Florence  met  him  with  open 
and  successful  opposition  ;  and  after  a  fruitless  cam- 
paign he  died  in  August,  13 13,  at  Buonconvento,  a 
little  fortified  town  in  the  territory  of  Siena.  It  was 
commonly  believed  that  a  priest  had  poisoned  the 
consecrated  elements,  but  there  is  no  evidence  of  foul 
play,  and  the  fatigues  of  an  arduous  campaign  may 
well  have  brought  about  Henry's  death  by  natural 
causes.  Indeed,  it  is  probable  that  many  suspected 
poisonings  in  the  Middle  Ages  were  really  cases  of 
"something  in — itis,"  which  the  medical  men  of  the 
day  were  incompetent  to  diagnose. 

Henry  was  laid  to  rest  in  his  faithful  Pisa,  where 
his  tomb,  by  the  master  hand  of  Giovanni  Pisano, 
may  still  be  seen  ;  and  in  his  grave  were  buried  the 
last  hopes  of  the  Florentine  exiles,  who  must  now 
choose  between  a  shameful  recantation  and  per- 
petual banishment.  Like  Dante,  Ser  Petracco  had 
once  already  rejected  the  former  alternative ;  he 
now  decided  to  leave  Italy  altogether,  and  to  settle 
in  Avignon,  whither  Clement  V  had  transferred  the 


14        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Papal  See  four  years  before.  So  the  party  left 
Pisa,  apparently  in  the  autumn  of  13 13,  and  travelled 
to  Genoa,  where  they  were  to  take  ship  for  Mar- 
seilles. Never  did  Petrarch  forget  that  wonderful 
journey  by  the  foot  of  the  Carrara  Mountains  and 
along  the  Eastern  Riviera.  Forty  years  later  he 
recalled  with  rapture  the  memory  "  as  of  a  lovely 
dream,  liker  to  a  heavenly  than  an  earthly  dwelling- 
place,  even  such  as  the  poets  celebrate  when  they 
sing  of  the  Elysian  fields."  The  pleasant  hill-paths, 
the  bright  ravines,  the  stately  towers  and  palaces 
enchanted  him  ;  the  hillsides  seemed  a  vast  garden 
of  cedar,  vine,  and  olive ;  and  when  at  length  he 
entered  Genoa,  it  seemed  to  him  "  a  city  of  Kings, 
the  very  temple  of  prosperity  and  threshold  of 
gladness." 

Though  short,  his  stay  in  Genoa  was  memorable 
for  the  formation  of  the  earliest  and  one  of  the  most 
intimate  of  his  many  friendships.  He  met  here 
Guido  Settimo,  a  boy  of  his  own  age,  who  was  to 
be  his  fellow  at  school  and  college,  his  host  at 
Avignon  and  guest  at  Vaucluse,  and  of  whom  he 
could  write  fifty  years  later  that  to  see  Guido,  then 
become  Archbishop  of  Genoa,  was  much  the  same 
as  to  see  himself,  since  they  had  lived  together 
from  childhood  in  perfect  harmony  of  disposition 
and  everything  else. 

Guido's  father,  like  Ser  Petracco,  was  about  to 
settle  at  Avignon  ;  so  at  Genoa  the  two  families 
took  ship  together  for  Marseilles.  A  southerly 
winter  gale  nearly  wrecked  them  outside  the 
harbour,  but  they  presently  got  safely  to  land,  and 


EARLY    YEARS  15 

journeyed  up  the  valley  of  the  Rhone  to  Avic^non. 
Here  they  found  themselves  in  a  fresh  difficulty  : 
"  the  place  could  barely  accommodate  the  Roman 
Pontiff  and  the  Church,  which  had  lately  followed 
him  thither  into  exile,  for  it  had  in  those  days  but  a 
small  number  of  houses,  so  that  it  was  overflowed 
by  this  deluge  of  visitors."  The  fathers,  accordingly, 
decided  to  establish  their  families  in  the  neighbour- 
ing town  of  Carpentras,  "a  little  city  in  truth,  but  still 
the  chief  place  of  a  little  province,"  where  they  found 
suitable  houses  for  themselves  and  a  grammar  school 
for  the  education  of  their  boys.  Here  Petrarch 
spent  four  of  the  happiest  years  of  his  life.  For 
politicians,  especially  for  those  whose  fortunes  were 
bound  up  with  the  Roman  Curia,  the  times  were 
troublous.  Pope  Clement  V  died  in  this  very  town 
of  Carpentras,  and  the  Conclave  assembled  there ; 
but  the  Cardinals  would  not  come  to  an  agreement, 
and  the  See  remained  vacant  for  two  years.  All 
this  mattered  nothing  to  the  two  boys.  "You  re- 
member those  four  years,"  Petrarch  writes  to  Guido 
in  the  letter  already  freely  quoted;  "what  a  delight- 
ful time  it  was,  with  perfect  freedom  from  care,  with 
peace  at  home  and  liberty  abroad,  and  with  its 
leisure  hours  spent  amid  the  silence  of  the  fields.  I 
am  sure  you  share  my  feelings,  and  certainly  I  am 
grateful  to  that  season,  or  rather  to  the  Author  of 
all  seasons,  who  allowed  me  those  years  of  absolute 
calm,  that  undisturbed  by  any  storm  of  trouble  I 
might  drink  in,  so  far  as  my  poor  wit  allowed,  the 
sweet  milk  of  boyish  learning,  to  strengthen  my 
mind  for  digesting  more  solid  nourishment." 


i6       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

The  "  sweet  milk  of  boyish  learning  "  was  ad- 
ministered by  Convennole  of  Prato,  perhaps  the 
most  celebrated  schoolmaster  of  his  day,  and  as 
famous  for  the  oddities  of  his  character  as  for  the 
excellence  of  his  teaching.  He  was  said  to  have 
kept  a  school  for  fully  sixty  years,  and  his  renown 
was  justified  by  the  number  of  his  pupils  who  after- 
wards attained  to  distinction  in  learning  and  politics 
and  to  positions  of  eminence  in  the  Church.  Among 
them  all  Petrarch  was  his  favourite  ;  this  was  so 
notorious  that  in  after -years  Cardinal  Giovanni 
Colonna,  who  delighted  in  the  old  man's  simplicity 
and  scholarship,  used  to  tease  him  by  asking : 
"  '  Tell  me,  master,  among  all  your  distinguished 
pupils,  whom  you  love,  as  I  know,  is  there  any 
room  in  your  heart  for  our  Francesco?'  And  there- 
upon the  old  man's  tears  would  rise  so  that  he 
would  either  be  silent,  or  sometimes  go  away,  or,  if 
he  was  able  to  speak,  he  would  swear  by  everything 
sacred  that  he  loved  none  of  them  all  so  well." 
There  is  good  reason  to  think  that  he  had  been 
Petrarch's  tutor  in  Italy,  and  that  he  accompanied 
the  family  to  Avignon  and  Carpentras ;  at  all  events, 
he  transferred  his  school  thither,  and  there  Petrarch 
advanced  under  his  tuition  from  childish  lessons  to 
profounder  studies  in  Latin  grammar  and  litera- 
ture, in  rhetoric  and  in  dialectic.  The  last  that  we 
hear  of  Convennole  is  a  tragi-comic  episode  which 
resulted  in  a  serious  literary  loss.  In  his  old  age 
he  fell  into  great  poverty,  and  Ser  Petracco  helped 
him  liberally  with  money ;  after  the  latter's  death 
he  relied  wholly  on  Petrarch,  who  gave  him  money 


EARLY    YEARS  17 

when  he  could,  and  when  he  had  none,  as  was 
often  the  case,  procured  him  loans  from  richer 
friends,  or  lent  him  something  to  pawn.  One  day 
the  old  man's  distress  got  the  better  of  his  honesty. 
He  borrowed  two  works  of  Cicero,  the  unique  MS. 
of  the  De  Gloria  and  The  Laws,  together  with  some 
other  books,  ostensibly  for  literary  work  of  his  own, 
"  for  not  a  day  passed  without  his  planning  out 
some  work  with  a  high-sounding  title,  and  writing  a 
preface  for  it,  after  which  his  fickle  fancy  would 
straightway  fly  off  to  some  totally  different  matter." 
Presently  his  delay  in  returning  the  books  led 
Petrarch  to  suspect  the  truth,  and  he  found  that 
Convennole  had  pawned  them.  He  would  have 
redeemed  them  himself,  and  beorored  to  be  told  the 
pawnbroker's  name  ;  but  the  old  man  in  an  agony 
of  shame  protested  that  he  would  do  his  duty,  and 
begged  for  time  to  redeem  his  honour.  Petrarch 
would  insist  no  further ;  but  Convennole's  neces- 
sities presently  obliged  him  to  return  to  Tuscany, 
where  he  soon  afterwards  died,  and  Petrarch,  who 
was  then  at  Vaucluse,  heard  nothing  of  his  de- 
parture till  the  people  of  Prato  sent  to  ask  him  to 
write  his  epitaph.  In  spite  of  every  effort,  he  could 
never  find  a  trace  of  his  missing  Cicero  ;  "  and  so," 
he  says,  "  I  lost  my  books  and  my  tutor  at  the 
same  time."  Of  The  Laws,  other  copies  were  pre- 
served, but  the  De  Gloria  has  been  a  lost  book 
from  that  day. 

It  was  while  still  a  schoolboy  at  Carpentras,  and 
probably  very  early  in  his  stay  there,  that  Petrarch 
first  saw  Vaucluse,  the  place  which  was  afterwards 
c 


i8        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

to  be  more  closely  associated  with  his  name  than  any 
of  his  residences.  Ser  Petracco  one  day  brought 
home  Guido  Settimo's  uncle  as  his  guest,  and  he, 
being  a  stranger  to  the  neighbourhood,  was  anxious 
to  see  the  celebrated  source  of  the  Sorgue.  The  two 
boys  begged  to  be  allowed  to  share  the  excursion, 
and  as  they  were  too  small  to  ride  on  horseback  alone, 
they  were  mounted  each  in  front  of  a  servant,  and  in 
this  fashion  Eletta,  "the  best  of  all  mothers  that  ever 
I  knew,"  as  Petrarch  calls  her,  who  loved  the  little 
Guido  almost  as  well  as  her  own  boys,  was  content 
to  let  them  otq.  "  And  when  we  arrived  at  the 
source  of  the  Sorgue,"  Petrarch  continues,  "  I  re- 
member as  though  it  had  happened  to-day  how  I  was 
moved  by  the  strange  beauty  of  the  spot,  and  how 
I  spoke  my  boyish  thoughts  to  myself  as  well  as  I 
could  to  this  effect :  Here  is  the  place  which  best 
suits  with  my  temper,  and  which,  if  ever  I  have  the 
chance,  I  will  prefer  before  great  cities." 

After  four  happy  years  at  Carpentras  the  troubles 
of  Petrarch's  life  began,  when  his  father  sent  him 
to  study  law  at  the  High  School  of  Montpellier. 
Petrarch,  now  in  his  seventeenth  year  and  a  boy 
of  precocious  talent,  already  felt  that  literature  was 
his  vocation,  and  hitherto  his  father,  a  sound  scholar 
with  a  finer  literary  judgment  than  most  scholars 
of  the  day,  had  encouraged  him  in  his  tastes. 
"  From  my  boyhood,"  he  tells  us,  "at  the  age  when 
others  are  gaping  over  Prosper  and  Aisop,  I  buckled 
to  the  books  of  Cicero,  impelled  both  by  natural 
instinct  and  by  the  advice  of  my  father,  who  pro- 
fessed deep  veneration   for  that  author,   and  who 


EARLY   YEARS  19 

would  easily  have  gained  distinction  as  a  man  of 
letters  if  his  splendid  talent  had  not  been  diverted  by 
the  necessity  of  providing-  for  his  family.  ...  At 
that  time  I  could  not  understand  what  I  read,  but 
the  sweetness  of  the  language  and  majesty  of  the 
cadences  enchanted  me,  so  that  whatever  else  I 
read  or  heard  sounded  harsh  in  my  ears  and  quite 
discordant.  .  .  .  And  this  daily  increasing  ardour 
of  mine  was  favoured  by  my  father's  admiration  and 
the  sympathy  which  he  showed  for  awhile  with  my 
boyish  study."  Presently,  however,  Ser  Petracco 
changed  his  tone;  his  means  had  been  seriously  im- 
paired by  his  political  misfortunes  ;  his  son  must 
begin  to  think  of  a  profession  at  which  money  could 
be  earned  ;  what  more  natural  than  that  he  should 
destine  his  brilliant  boy  for  the  traditional  calling  of 
the  family,  in  which  he  himself  had  won  so  consider- 
able a  reputation  ?  It  was  well  enough  to  unbend 
the  mind  over  the  masterpieces  of  antiquity,  but  the 
study  of  them  must  not  interfere  with  the  serious 
business  of  life,  and  he  be^an  to  bid  the  lad  "foreet 
Cicero  and  set  himself  to  the  study  of  the  laws  of 
borrowing  and  lending,  of  wills  and  their  codicils, 
of  property  in  land  and  property  in  houses."  One 
day,  finding  that  the  young  scholar  could  not  be 
persuaded  to  divorce  himself  from  his  classics, 
Petracco  took  sterner  measures.  "  I  had  got  to- 
gether," says  Petrarch,  "all  the  works  of  Cicero 
that  I  could  find,  and  had  hidden  them  carefully 
away  for  fear  of  the  very  thing  that  actually  hap- 
pened, when  one  day  my  father  fished  them  out 
and  threw  them  into  the  fire  before  my  very  eyes, 


20       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

to  burn  like  the  books  of  the  heretics.  At  this 
I  set  up  as  terrible  a  howling  as  if  I  myself  had 
been  thrown  upon  the  logs,  whereupon  my  father, 
beholding  my  sorrow,  plucked  out  two  of  the  books 
just  as  the  flames  were  on  the  point  of  reaching 
them,  and  holdina  Virgil  in  his  rioht  hand  and 
Cicero's  Rhetoric  in  his  left,  gave  them  with  a 
smile,  as  an  offering  to  my  tears,  saying,  '  Keep 
the  one  for  an  occasional  hour  of  recreation,  and 
the  other  as  a  stimulus  to  your  study  of  civil  law.'" 

Petrarch  was  a  dutiful  son,  and  for  seven  years 
applied  himself  diligently  to  the  studies  marked  out 
for  him  by  his  father,  and  gave  promise  of  great 
proficiency  in  them  ;  but  all  the  time  his  heart  was 
elsewhere,  and  to  the  end  of  his  life  he  regarded 
this  period  of  legal  study  as  "  rather  wasted  than 
spent."  Probably  he  underrated  the  benefit  of  it ; 
an  eager,  fervent  temper  such  as  his  needs  discipline 
as  well  as  instruction,  and  it  may  be  that  the  steady 
grind  at  an  uncongenial  subject  did  much  to  develop 
his  indefatigable  industry,  and  to  enable  him  to  get 
the  best  results  out  of  his  genius  when  he  came  to 
apply  it  to  the  things  for  which  he  really  cared. 

At  all  events,  he  was  happy  at  Montpellier,  in 
spite  of  distasteful  studies.  The  place  was  then  "a 
most  flourishing  town,  the  sovereignty  of  which 
was  vested  in  the  King  of  Majorca  with  the  excep- 
tion of  one  corner  belonging  to  the  King  of  France, 
who  .  .  .  soon  afterwards  managed  to  get  posses- 
sion of  all  the  rest.  And  what  a  peaceful  calm  pre- 
vailed there  at  that  time,  what  wealth  its  merchants 
enjoyed,  how  full  of  scholars  were  the  streets,  and 


_^ 


EARLY   YEARS  21 

what  a  number  of  masters  tauorht  in  the  school ! " 
Above  all,  he  still  had  Guido  Settimo  for  his  com- 
panion during  the  whole  four  years  that  he  spent 
there ;  for  Guido  too  was  ordered  to  study  the  law, 
and  was  happier  than  his  friend  in  finding  it  con- 
genial to  his  tastes  and  disposition. 

Early  in  1323  the  two  friends  went  to  finish 
their  legal  training  at  Bologna,  whither  Petrarch's 
younger  brother,  Gherardo,  either  accompanied  or 
soon  afterwards  followed  them.  No  young  man 
could  be  better  qualified  than  Petrarch  to  enjoy  the 
pleasures  and  interests  of  university  life  ;  with  an 
insatiable  appetite  for  literature  he  combined  a 
capacity  for  friendship  which  assured  him  of  the 
full  benefit  of  the  social  life  of  the  place.  In 
Bologna,  the  premier  University  of  Italy,  he  found 
charming  surroundings  and  pleasant  companions,  so 
that  "nowhere  was  life  freer  or  more  deliorhtful," 
and  his  residence  there  seemed  "not  the  least  of 
the  benefits  which  God  had  given  him."  Only  the 
educational  methods  of  the  day  seemed  to  him 
radically  wrong.  "  Philosophy,"  he  protests,  "is  so 
prostituted  to  the  fancies  of  the  vulgar,  that  it  aims 
only  at  hair-splitting  on  subtle  distinctions  and 
quibbles  of  words.  .  .  .  Truth  is  utterly  lost  sight 
of,  sound  practice  is  neglected,  and  the  reality  of 
things  is  despised.  .  .  .  People  concentrate  their 
whole  attention  on  empty  words." 

For  himself,  he  continued  "  to  bend  beneath 
the  weight  of  legal  study"  during  the  whole  of  his 
residence  at  Bologrna,  his  tutor  beincj  the  Canonist 
Giovanni  Andrea,  the  most  celebrated  lawyer  of  the 


22        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

time,  "a  chief  glory  of  the  city  and  University," 
where  he  held  the  Chair  of  Canon  Law  for  forty- 
five  years.  Unhappily  he  was  not  satisfied  with 
being  first  in  his  own  profession,  but  assumed  the 
airs  of  a  dictator  in  literature  and  criticism  too,  a 
pose  in  which  his  ignorance  and  arrogance  at 
once  amazed  and  disgusted  his  more  cultivated 
pupils.  Yet  tutor  and  pupil  must  have  been  on 
good  terms  on  the  whole,  for  they  made  an  expedi- 
tion together  to  Venice  for  the  mere  pleasure  of 
seeing  the  place,  and  may  probably  have  included 
visits  to  Pesaro  and  the  country  round  Rimini  in 
the  same  tour. 

Petrarch  appears  to  have  had  no  other  tutor  while 
at  Bologna,  for  the  old  tradition,  which  made  him 
the  pupil  of  Cino  da  Pistoia  there,  is  certainly 
erroneous.  The  two  poets  admired  each  other ; 
they  exchanged  poems  during  Cino's  lifetime,  and 
Petrarch  wrote  the  beautiful  sonnet  Piangete,  Donne 
as  a  lament  for  his  death.  Moreover,  the  young 
poet's  genius  was  influenced  for  good  by  his  study 
of  the  elder's  art,  and  in  this  sense  only  he  may  be 
called  a  pupil  of  Cino.  The  latter  was  probably 
absent  from  Bologna  duringr  the  whole  of  Petrarch's 
residence  there. 

The  study  of  law  and  the  companionship  of  his 
tutor  were  far  from  monopolising  Petrarch's  time 
at  the  University.  His  leisure  hours  were  devoted 
to  literature  and  to  rambles  round  the  city  in  com- 
pany with  his  friends.  One  of  these  was  a  young 
poet,  Tommaso  Caloria  of  Messina,  with  whom 
Petrarch  soon  formed  one  of  those  close  and  ardent 


EARLY   YEARS  23 

friendships  the  record  of  which  is  the  most  delight- 
ful feature  of  his  biography.  Their  tastes  were  con- 
genial, their  talents  similar  in  kind  if  not  in  degree, 
and  Petrarch  thought  so  highly  of  Tommaso's 
genius  as  to  name  him  among  the  poets  in  the 
Triumph  of  Love.  Something  of  this  high  estimate 
may  have  been  due  to  the  partiality  of  friendship, 
but  Petrarch's  critical  instinct  was  not  easily  misled 
even  by  the  fervour  of  his  affections. 

With  Tommaso,  Guido,  and  other  friends,  Pet- 
rarch spent  many  a  holiday  in  rambles  through  the 
delightful  country  of  the  Emilia  which  lies  round 
Bologna.  *'  I  used  to  go  with  those  of  my  own 
age,"  he  says,  "  and  on  festal  days  we  would  wander 
to  a  great  distance,  so  that  the  sun  often  set  while 
we  were  still  in  the  country,  and  we  did  not  get 
back  till  the  dead  of  night.  But  the  city  gates 
stood  open,  or  if  by  any  chance  they  had  been 
shut,  there  was  no  wall  to  the  town,  but  only  a 
brittle  paling  half  rotten  by  age  ...  so  that  you 
could  approach  it  from  numberless  points,  and  each 
of  us  could  make  entry  where  it  suited  his  con- 
venience." We  are  accustomed  to  think  of  the 
fourteenth  century  as  a  turbulent  age,  when  might 
was  right,  and  a  city's  safety  lay  in  the  strength  of 
her  walls  and  the  courage  of  her  people.  It  is  a 
little  surprising,  therefore,  to  read  of  this  free,  joyous 
student  life,  and  still  more  so  to  hear  of  a  rotten 
paling  as  the  only  rampart  of  an  Italian  town. 

Before  Petrarch  had  quite  completed  his  twenty- 
second  year,  he  and  Gherardo  were  summoned 
home  by  the  news  of  their  father's  death  ;  they  left 


24       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Bologna  on  April  26th,  1326,  and  travelled  with  all 
speed  to  Avignon.  Ser  Petracco  was  not  quite 
sixty  years  old,  and  his  death  must  have  come  with 
the  shock  of  a  surprise  to  the  family,  for  his  health 
had  been  good,  and  so  little  had  he  felt  the  weight 
of  years,  that  he  threw  the  whole  household  into 
commotion  in  his  indignation  at  finding  the  first 
white  hair  on  his  head  when  more  than  fifty  years 
of  aore.  This  is  the  single  humorous  anecdote  of 
him  that  has  come  down  to  us  ;  for  the  rest  he 
seems  to  have  been  an  austere  man,  who  failed  to 
win  the  full  confidence  of  his  children,  though  he 
always  commanded  their  deep  respect.  He  had 
lived  a  hard  life,  which  may  well  have  deadened  his 
sensibilities,  and,  after  all,  he  was  not  more  despotic 
than  most  parents,  who  claim  to  mould  their 
children's  lives  without  taking  due  account  of 
peculiarities  in  their  temperament.  Intellectually  he 
had  much  in  common  with  his  greater  son,  though 
he  lacked  the  latter's  delicate  fancy  and  creative 
genius;  morally  the  father  was  probably  the  stronger 
man  of  the  two,  but  in  the  strength  of  his  character 
there  was  an  element  of  harshness,  and  the  more 
finely  strung  nature  of  the  son,  with  his  keenness  of 
human  sympathy  and  his  enthusiasm  for  noble 
ideals,  appeals  more  successfully  to  the  imagination 
and  affection  of  mankind. 

A  still  keener  sorrow  was  in  store  for  the  brothers. 
Eletta,  according  to  the  received  tradition,  which  is 
probably  correct,  died  only  a  few  weeks  after  her 
husband.  Though  Petrarch  mentions  her  very 
seldom  in  his  extant  writings,  there  is  enough  to 


EARLY   YEARS  25 

show  the  depth  and  enthusiasm  of  his  love  for  her. 
His  allusion  to  her  as  "  the  best  of  all  mothers  that 
ever  he  knew  "  has  been  already  quoted,  and  the 
Latin  poem  in  which  he  laments  her  death  over- 
flows with  tenderness.     He  calls  her 

Elect  of  God  no  less  in  deed  than  name ; 
speaks  of  her  as  possessing 

Nobility  to  wake  the  Muses'  choir, 
Supreme  affection,  majesty  of  soul ; 

and  declares  that 

The  good  will  aye  revere  thee ;  I  must  weep 
Thy  loss  for  aye  !     Not  verily  that  Death 
Brings  aught  of  terrible  to  thee,  we  grieve  ; 
But  that  thou,  sweetest  mother,  leavest  us. 
Me  and  my  brother,  wearied,  where  the  ways 
Of  Life  divide,  midst  of  a  stormy  world. 

Throughout  his  life  her  memory  remained  fresh  in 
his  heart,  and  when  a  little  granddaughter  was  born 
to  him  in  his  old  age,  he  had  the  child  christened 
by  the  cherished  name  of  Eletta. 


CHAPTER    II 

AVIGNON   AND   LAURA 

1326-1329 

SER  PETRACCO  had  done  much  to  retrieve 
his  fortune  ;  two  years  previously  he  had  been 
able  to  provide  a  suitable  dowry  for  his  natural 
daughter  Selvaggia  on  her  marriage  with  a  gentle- 
man of  Florence,  and  at  his  death  he  left  a  sub- 
stantial amount  of  property.  But  not  a  penny  of 
this  inheritance  ever  reached  its  lawful  owners ; 
the  executors  contrived  to  convey  it  all  to  their 
own  uses.  "The  plague  of  faithless  guardians," 
Petrarch  wrote  many  years  afterwards  to  his  brother, 
"pursued  us  from  our  boyhood.  Thanks  to  our 
bad  luck  or  our  simplicity,  we  seemed  a  couple  of 
solitary  lads  not  given  to  making  close  scrutiny  and 
easy  to  fleece.  'Tis  an  old  truism  that  opportunity 
makes  the  thief ;  and  this  opportunity  made  us 
poor  instead  of  rich,  or  rather — let  us  recognise  the 
bounty  of  God — it  made  us  men  of  leisure  instead 
of  men  of  affairs,  unburdened  instead  of  heavily 
laden."  The  only  fragment  of  his  inheritance  that 
Petrarch  ever  received  was  "a  volume  of  Cicero  so 
exquisite  that  you  could  hardly  find  its  equal,  which 
my  father  used  to  cherish  as  his  darling  treasure, 
and  which  escaped  the  hands  of  his  executors  not 

26 


AVIGNON    AND    LAURA  27 

because  they  wished  to  save  it  for  me,  but  because 
they  were  busy  plundering  what  they  considered 
the  more  valuable  portions  of  my  inheritance." 
Unhappily  this  beautiful  MS.  was  pawned  together 
with  the  Dc  Gloria  by  old  Convennole,  and  so 
Petrarch  lost  the  last  vestige  of  his  father's  property. 

Being  now  his  own  master,  he  determined  to  be 
not  a  lawyer,  but  a  scholar  and  a  poet.  He  made 
his  choice  deliberately,  and  he  never  regretted  it ; 
his  instinct  told  him  truly  that  the  advancement  of 
learning  was  his  vocation,  and  never  was  any  man's 
choice  of  work  more  fully  justified  by  the  event.  It 
is  hardly  possible  to  exaggerate  the  effect  of  that 
choice  on  the  revival  of  learning  in  Europe. 

But  a  scholar  in  the  early  fourteenth  century 
could  not  live  by  his  pen.  At  Florence  and  Bologna 
the  men  of  letters  were  mostly  lawyers  ;  elsewhere, 
and  especially  at  the  Papal  Court,  they  were  nearly 
always  Churchmen.  Petrarch's  course  was  obvious  ; 
he  immediately  took  the  minor  orders,  which  were 
sufficient  to  give  him  a  locus  standi  and  hopes  of 
preferment  in  the  Church  without  fettering  his 
liberty  of  action,  but  he  delayed  till  long  afterwards 
his  ordination  as  priest,  which  was  a  far  graver 
matter,  and  might  possibly  have  hindered  rather 
than  helped  him  in  his  early  career.  It  has  some- 
times been  urged  as  a  reproach  against  him  that  he 
entered  the  Church  without  any  vocation  to  the 
ministry  ;  and  his  defenders  have  replied  that  in  so 
doing  he  only  followed  the  custom  of  the  age,  that 
the  minor  orders  imply  no  stringent  obligation  and 
require   no  special   vocation,  and  that   in   spite  of 


28       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

occasional  human  frailties  he  was  one  of  the  most 
devout-minded  men  of  his  time,  with  strong  re- 
ligious tendencies  even  in  the  early  youth  which  he 
spent,  to  use  his  own  words,  "  in  subjection  to  his 
vanities."  All  these  answers  are  valid,  but  to  say 
the  truth  they  are  all  superfluous.  The  Church  of 
the  Middle  A^es  took  thought  for  men's  intellects 
as  well  as  for  their  souls  ;  she  was  organised  for 
mental  culture  as  well  as  for  spiritual  devotion  ;  and 
the  scholar  found  his  natural  place  in  her  ranks  side 
by  side  with  the  preacher  and  the  theologian. 

Circumstances  equally  dictated  his  choice  of 
a  residence.  He  hated  Avignon :  he  declaims 
with  quite  comic  vehemence  against  its  very  soil 
and  climate,  calling  it  "  the  melancholy  Avignon, 
built  upon  a  rugged  rock,  on  the  banks  of  the 
windiest  of  rivers."  Much  more  violent  are  his 
denunciations  of  its  politics  and  its  morals.  Avig- 
non, as  the  seat  of  the  Papal  Court,  was  treasonably 
usurping  the  sovereign  rights  of  Rome ;  she  was 
the  Babylon  of  a  captivity  worse  than  the  Jewish, 
because  voluntary  and  base;  Babylon  is  his  habitual 
name  for  her,  and  under  this  opprobrious  nickname 
he  denounces  alike  the  perfidy  of  her  rulers  and  the 
wickedness  of  her  inhabitants.  And  the  society  in 
which  the  gay  licence  of  Provence  met  the  darker 
corruptions  of  an  unscrupulous  priesthood  furnished 
only  too  much  matter  for  his  diatribes.  Yet  no- 
where else  could  he  think  of  establishing  himself 
His  father  had  formed  influential  connections  at  the 
Papal  Court,  and  he  himself  was  beginning  to  be 
known  in  the  city;  in  no  other  place  could  a  brilliant 


AVIGNON    AND    LAURA  29 

young"  Churchman  begin  his  career  with  such  hope 
of  speedy  preferment ;  most  important  of  all,  the 
intellectual  opportunities  and  interests  of  Avignon 
were  unrivalled  in  Europe.  That  it  was  the  native 
home  of  the  Proven9al  school  of  poetry,  which  had 
reached  its  zenith  more  than  a  century  before,  was 
the  least  of  its  merits.  As  the  seat  of  the  Papacy 
it  was  a  cosmopolitan  city,  the  centre  of  European 
politics,  the  goal  of  envoys  from  every  court,  of 
scholars  from  every  university,  and  the  resort  of  the 
greatest  artists  in  Italy,  summoned  thither  to  decorate 
the  palace  of  the  Popes.  It  was  here  that  Petrarch 
met  his  friend  Simone  Martini,  commonly  called 
Memmi,  of  Siena,  who  is  said  to  have  painted  the 
beautiful  portraits  of  him  and  Laura  preserved  in 
the  Laurentian  Library  at  Florence,  and  to  have 
introduced  portraits  of  them  into  his  great  fresco  in 
the  Spaniards'  Chapel  there.  The  latter  portraits, 
if  really  the  work  of  Martini,  which  is  doubtful, 
must  have  been  painted  from  memory,  for  Petrarch 
was  never  in  Florence  during  the  painting  of  this 
fresco,  and  Laura  was  never  there  at  all ;  and  they 
show  much  less  individuality  of  feature  and  expres- 
sion than  the  former  pair.  The  Laurentian  por- 
trait of  Laura  may  possibly  have  been  the  one 
which  Petrarch  commissioned  Memmi  to  paint  for 
him,  and  for  which  he  thanked  him  in  two  sonnets 
couched  in  terms  of  warm  affection  and  hig-h 
esteem. 

This  society  of  artists,  scholars,  statesmen,  and 
men  of  the  world  was  an  ideal  environment  for  a 
young  man  eager  to  acquire  and  diffuse  knowledge, 


30       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

eager  also  for  personal  renown;  and  the  astonishing 
speed  with  which  Petrarch's  celebrity  as  a  poet 
spread  through  Europe  must  have  been  mainly  clue 
to  the  men  of  all  countries  who  learned  to  appreciate 
him  at  Avignon.  He  himself  admitted  that  no- 
where else,  as  things  stood,  could  he  have  found 
such  opportunities  as  were  open  to  him  at  Avignon; 
only  he  held  that  things  ought  to  have  been  other- 
wise, and  these  opportunities  should  have  been 
open  to  him  not  at  Avignon,  but  in  Rome. 

However  great  may  have  been  his  disgust  at  the 
fouler  corruptions  of  Avignonese  society,  he  took 
his  full  share  of  its  pleasures  and  gaieties.  He  was 
at  this  time  a  young  man  of  engaging  appearance, 
comely  if  not  strikingly  handsome,  with  a  high 
colour  and  a  complexion  rather  fair  than  dark  ;  his 
eyes  were  animated  in  expression  and  remarkably 
keen  of  sight — in  the  Laurentian  library  portrait 
they  are  rather  small,  but  very  clear  and  beautiful — 
he  was  of  middle  height,  and  his  limbs,  though  not 
very  strong,  were  well  knit  and  agile.  In  early 
and  middle  life  his  health  was  robust,  and  he  was 
extremely  temperate  in  his  habits,  "drinking  noth- 
ing but  water  throughout  his  childhood  and  down 
to  the  close  of  the  period  of  youth,"  From  the 
Laurentian  portrait  we  see  further  that  he  had  an 
intellectual  face,  with  a  rather  low  but  very  massive 
forehead,  a  large,  straight  nose,  delicately  arched 
eyebrows,  high  and  well-modelled  cheekbones,  and 
a  beautiful  mouth  with  lips  that  shut  at  once  firmly 
and  smilingly.  By  the  time  that  he  sat  for  this 
picture  his  chin  had  grown  double,  but  still  kept  the 


AVIGNON    AND    LAURA  31 

appearance  of  having  been  finely  cut  in  younorer 
days.  He  was  well  qualified  for  the  part  of  a 
dandy,  and  played  it  with  his  brother's  support  to 
admiration.  "  You  remember,"  he  writes  twenty 
years  later,  "  the  quite  superfluous  gloss  of  our 
exquisite  raiment,  and  our  daintiness  in  putting  it 
on  and  off,  a  troublesome  business  which  we  per- 
formed morning  and  evening  ;  you  remember  too 
our  terror  lest  a  single  hair  should  get  out  of  place, 
or  a  breath  of  wind  rufile  the  arrangement  of  our 
curls,  and  how  we  swerved  from  every  horse  that 
met  or  passed  us,  lest  a  speck  of  dust  should  mar 
the  shine  of  our  scented  cloaks,  or  a  touch  should 
disarrange  the  folds  in  which  we  had  laid  them. 
.  .  .  And  what  shall  I  say  of  our  shoes  ?  What  a 
cruel,  unremitting  warfare  they  waged  with  our  feet, 
which  they  were  supposed  to  protect !  They  would 
soon  have  made  mine  quite  useless,  if  I  had  not 
taken  warning  by  the  straits  to  which  I  was  pushed, 
and  preferred  giving  a  little  offence  to  other  folk's 
eyes  before  crushing  my  own  muscles  and  joints. 
And  what  of  our  curling-tongs  and  the  dressing  of 
our  hair?  How  often  the  toil  of  it  delayed  our 
sleep  at  night  and  cut  it  short  in  the  morning! 
Could  any  pirate  have  tortured  us  more  cruelly  than 
we  tortured  ourselves  by  twisting  cords  round  our 
heads  ?  We  twisted  them  so  tight  indeed  at  night, 
that  in  the  morning  our  mirror  showed  us  crimson 
furrows  across  our  foreheads,  and  in  our  anxiety  to 
show  off  our  hair  we  had  to  make  it  hide  our 
faces." 

But  though  he  ruffled   it   with   the   best  of  the 


32       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

dandies,  so  that  all  Avignon  pointed  him  out  as  a 
model  of  elegance,  he  never  allowed  frivolity  to 
distract  him  from  scholarship.  He  was  bent  on 
acquiring  knowledge,  and  he  found  friends,  some  of 
them  much  older  than  himself,  who  were  able  and 
willing  to  help  him.  One  of  them  was  Giovanni 
of  Florence,  one  of  the  Pope's  writers,  an  old  man 
well  qualified  by  character,  learning,  and  experience 
to  be  an  adviser  of  youth.  To  him  Petrarch  con- 
fided his  hopes  and  his  difficulties,  and  in  return  the 
old  man  spoke  to  him  of  the  true  method  and  right 
aim  of  study,  bidding  him  not  to  be  cast  down  by 
an  apparent  check  in  his  pursuit  of  learning,  seeing 
that  the  recognition  of  our  ignorance  is  the  first 
step  to  knowledge.  In  the  last  year  of  his  life 
Petrarch  was  asked  to  advise  a  young  man  who 
feared  that  he  had  come  to  a  standstill  in  his  work, 
and  answered  that  he  could  do  no  better  than  repeat 
to  him  the  counsel  which  he  had  himself  received 
from  Giovanni  of  Florence. 

Another  friend  by  whose  affectionate  help  and 
advice  he  profited  much  was  the  lawyer  Raimondo 
Soranzio,  "a  venerable  and  noble  old  man,"  who 
gloriously  sacrificed  all  hope  of  preferment  by  with- 
standing the  Pope  himself  in  a  good  cause.  He 
possessed  a  fine  library  of  the  classics,  though  he 
himself  cared  little  about  any  of  them  except  Livy, 
and  he  generously  allowed  Petrarch  the  free  use  of 
his  books  ;  indeed,  it  was  he  who  lent  him  the  De 
Gloria,  of  which  the  melancholy  history  has  already 
been  told. 

So  far  Petrarch's  life  had  been  a  happy  one  ;  he 


FKOM    A    CDl'V    UY   .MUS.    AR  IHUK    LEMON    OK   THK    I'DRTKAIl     IN     rlfF.   I.AURENTIAN    LIKK'AUV, 

FLORENCE 


AVIGNON   AND    LAURA  33 

had  met  with  misfortunes,  it  is  true,  but  they  were 
not  of  such  a  kind  as  could  daunt  a  high-spirited 
youth,  and  many  an  ambitious  young  man  of  letters 
would  gladly  compound  for  them  all  on  condition 
of  having  Petrarch's  advantages.  But  now,  in 
the  twenty-third  year  of  his  age  and  less  than  a 
year  after  his  return  to  Avignon,  the  great  crisis  of 
his  life  came  upon  him,  bringing  him  twenty-one 
years  of  deep  unhappiness,  hardly  compensated  by 
the  enduring  renown  which  was  its  fruit.  On 
the  6th  April,  1327,  at  the  hour  of  Prime,  he  first 
saw  Laura  in  the  Church  of  St.  Claire,  and  was 
overwhelmed  at  once  with  the  love  of  which  he 
tells  us:  "In  my  youth  I  bore  the  stress  of  a 
passion  most  violent,  though  honourable  and  the 
single  one  of  my  life  ;  and  I  should  have  borne  it 
even  longer  than  I  did,  had  not  Death,  opportune 
in  spite  of  its  bitterness,  quenched  the  flame  just  as 
it  was  beginning  to  grow  less  intense."  It  is  to  the 
vicissitudes  of  this  deep  and  enduring  passion  that 
we  owe  the  poems  by  which  their  author  holds  his 
high  rank  among  the  masters  of  song. 

Who  was  Laura?  Frankly,  we  do  not  know. 
In  all  probability  Petrarch  purposely  destroyed  all 
marks  of  identification  ;  if  this  was  his  intention, 
his  success  was  complete,  and  the  riddle  will  prob- 
ably never  be  answered  with  certainty.  So  careful 
was  the  lover  to  guard  his  lady's  secret,  that  even 
in  his  lifetime  his  friends  would  tease  him  by  pre- 
tending to  believe  that  he  was  in  love  with  no 
woman  at  all,  but  only  with  the  laurel  crown  of 
poetry,   which    he   symbolised   under  the  name  of 


34       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Laura;  and  this  allegorical  theory  has  never  been 
quite  without  adherents.  Happily  no  reasonable 
person,  acquainted  with  all  the  evidence  and  with 
Petrarch's  methods  of  thought  and  expression,  can 
doubt  its  falsity.  That  in  answer  to  a  friend's 
banter  he  protested  the  reality  of  his  passion  counts 
for  little ;  of  course  he  would  have  done  that 
whether  he  were  maintaining  a  fact  or  a  fiction. 
But  the  manner  of  his  protestation,  with  its  revela- 
tion of  a  spirit  vexed  by  fluctuating  emotions  and 
conflicting  desires,  carries  conviction.  Much  more 
conclusive,  however,  indeed  absolutely  conclusive, 
are  the  references  to  Laura  in  his  Dialogues  De 
Contemptu  Mundi,  and  the  two  pathetic  entries  on 
the  fly-leaf  of  his  Virgil.  The  Dialogues,  which  he 
called  his  Sccretum,  were  written  for  himself  alone ; 
under  the  form  of  a  dialogue  with  Saint  Augustine 
they  constitute  a  private  record  of  his  inmost 
thoughts  and  feelings.  He  never  published  them  ; 
it  is  doubtful  whether  even  his  most  intimate  friends 
were  ever  allowed  to  read  them ;  their  very  exist- 
ence was  certainly  unknown  till  after  his  death  to 
the  great  body  of  his  admirers.  Yet  it  is  precisely 
in  this  private  record  that  we  find  the  most  valu- 
able information  as  to  his  love  for  Laura  and  its 
effect  on  his  character  and  his  work.  And  on  the 
fly-leaf  of  his  Virgil,  the  book  which  he  carried 
everywhere  with  him,  now  preserved  in  the  Am- 
brosian  Library  at  Milan,  he  noted  down,  again  for 
his  own  eye  only,  among  the  most  solemn  events 
of  his  life,  the  dates  of  his  first  meeting  with  Laura 
and  of  her  death.     This  is  conclusive ;  for  on  no 


AVIGNON    AND    LAURA  35 

conceivable  theory  can  Petrarch,  writing  for  himself 
only,  have  set  down  the  date  of  Laura's  death  in  1 348, 
if  she  was  but  the  symbol  of  his  laurel  crown,  which 
he  gained  in  1341,  and  which  showed  no  sign  of 
fading  during  his  lifetime.  But  if  the  support  of 
circumstantial  evidence  is  wanted,  there  is  plenty  to 
be  had.  The  Canzoniere,  for  instance,  describes 
in  minutest  detail  every  feature  of  the  beloved 
lady's  face  except  her  nose ;  it  is  hard  to  imagine  a 
poet  spending  so  much  pains  on  the  unsubstantial 
features  of  an  allegorical  picture  ;  it  is  quite  incon- 
ceivable that,  describing  all  the  rest,  he  should 
forget  the  most  prominent  of  them  all ;  had  Laura 
been  a  mere  allegory,  we  should  have  had  either  no 
portrait  or  a  complete  one.  Nor  is  it  conceivable 
that  Petrarch  would  have  spoken  of  a  fictitious 
passion  in  the  terms  of  strong  abhorrence  which, 
under  occasional  impulses  of  ascetic  fervour,  he 
applied  to  his  earthly  love.  The  strength  of  a 
reaction  is  a  sure  gauge  of  the  strength  of  the  action 
which  preceded  it,  and  the  intemperate  fervour  of 
Petrarch  the  ascetic  bears  witness  to  the  intensity 
of  the  emotions  of  Petrarch  the  lover  and  the  poet. 
Laura  was  a  real  woman,  and  Petrarch  was 
desperately  her  lover ;  so  much  may  safely  be  as- 
serted, so  much  and  no  more.  We  do  not  even 
know  that  her  real  name  was  Laura ;  here  may  well 
be  the  grain  of  truth  from  which  the  whole  alle- 
gorical myth  sprung ;  nothing  is  more  likely  than 
that  Petrarch,  who  constantly  gave  nicknames  of 
affection  to  his  friends,  should  have  called  the  lady 
whom  he  loved  by  a  name  that  associated  her  in  his 


36       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

fancy  and  in  the  ears  of  the  world  with  his  life's 
ambition.  Was  she  married  or  single  ?  Again  we 
do  not  know.  The  received  opinion  follows  the 
conjecture  of  the  Abb^  de  Sade,  and  identifies  her 
with  his  ancestress,  Laura  de  Noves,  wife  of  Count 
Hugo  de  Sade,  a  nobleman  of  Avignon.  But  the 
evidence  for  her  marriage  rests  mainly  on  a  question- 
able interpretation  of  a  single  Latin  contraction, 
while  the  general  tone  of  the  Canzoiiiere  supports 
the  theory  that  she  was  unmarried.  If  this 
was  the  case,  Petrarch  may  well  have  called  his 
love  for  her  an  "  honourable  "  passion,  not  merely 
in  the  sense  in  which  Provencal  courts  of  love 
adjudged  honourable  the  devotion  of  a  troubadour 
to  his  lady,  but  in  the  more  modern  and  domestic 
sense  that  he  hoped  to  win  her  in  marriage  ;  for 
a  dispensation  from  the  minor  orders  could  easily 
be  obtained,  though  the  story  of  Pope  Clement  VI 
having  offered  him  a  dispensation  from  priest's 
orders  must  be  dismissed  as  an  idle  tale. 

Another  theory,  much  in  vogue  just  now,  repre- 
sents her  as  a  simple  village  maiden,  possibly  of 
gentle  birth  and  able  to  read  the  Italian  poems  of 
her  lover,  but  innocent  of  the  turmoil  of  city  society, 
living  and  dying  at  the  foot  of  a  hill  a  few  miles  out 
of  Vaucluse,  and  buried  within  the  precincts  of  the 
valley.  It  is  a  pretty  theory ;  unfortunately  it 
raises  more  difficulties  than  it  solves,  and  contra- 
dicts more  facts  than  it  explains.  The  riddle  is  still 
unread. 

Whoever  she  was,  there  is  no  exaggerating  the 
effects  of  her  influence  on  her  lover.     His  love  for 


AVIGNON   AND    LAURA  37 

her  was  the  critical  experience  of  his  life,  and  under 
its  stimulus  his  whole  nature  leaped  into  fuller  and 
more  vigorous  life.  Laura  gave  him  little  encour- 
agement and  no  hope  that  she  would  ever  return 
his  love ;  great  was  his  joy  when  he  received  so 
much  as  a  smile  or  a  kindly  glance  from  her  whose 
perfections  he  was  making  celebrated  through  the 
length  and  breadth  of  Europe.  Once,  when  he  so 
far  presumed  upon  her  mood  of  unwonted  kindliness 
as  to  talk  to  her  openly  of  love,  she  bade  him  know 
that  she  was  not  such  an  one  as  he  seemed  to  think 
her.  Her  coldness  purified  his  passion  ;  in  spite  of 
himself  he  revered  a  chastity  so  uncommon  in  the 
society  in  which  he  lived.  He  suffered,  but  his 
moral  nature  o-ained  strength  and  elevation  from 
the  suffering.  "  Through  love  of  her,"  he  wrote  in 
his  Secrettcm,  "I  attained  to  love  of  God";  and 
again,  *'  It  is  to  her  that  I  owe  what  little  merit  you 
see  in  me,  and  I  should  never  have  gained  such 
name  and  fame  as  I  have,  save  for  the  nobility  of 
feeling  with  which  she  cultivated  the  sparse  seeds 
of  virtue  planted  by  nature  in  my  breast.  It  was 
she  who  reclaimed  my  youthful  spirit  from  all  base- 
ness." 

No  less  remarkable  was  the  quickening  of  his 
intellectual  powers.  He  had  been  "devoted  to  the 
study  of  poetry  long  before  he  saw  Laura,"  and  his 
earlier  verses  had  won  him  no  little  repute  among 
men  of  taste  and  learning.  Yet  of  these  Juvenilia 
he  has  allowed  not  a  line  to  come  down  to  us.  He 
coveted  high  renown  ;  he  wished  to  live  by  his  best 
work  alone  ;  and  when  at  a  later  date  he  came  to 


38       PETRARCH    AND    HIS  TIMES 

arrange  his  papers  for  eventual  publication,  he  care- 
fully destroyed  everything  which  his  maturer  judg- 
ment pronounced  incapable  of  sustaining  his  reputa- 
tion. He  then  threw  into  the  fire  "  a  thousand  or 
more  letters  and  poems,"  among  which,  as  de  Sade 
ingeniously  conjectures,  were  probably  included  all 
the  letters  containing  references  to  Laura  and  to 
the  incidents  of  his  intercourse  with  her ;  and  the 
earlier  Italian  poems  doubtless  formed  part  of  the 
same  literary  holocaust.  These  must  have  had 
considerable  merits,  for  no  mere  rubbish  could  have 
obtained  a  vogue  in  such  a  society  as  that  of  Avig- 
non ;  but  we  may  be  sure  that  Petrarch  would  not 
have  destroyed  them  if  they  had  been  on  a  level 
with  his  later  work.  It  is  safe  to  conclude  that,  till 
his  meeting  with  Laura,  he  had  shown  little  more 
than  the  promise  of  poetical  excellence.  Now,  how- 
ever, under  the  stimulus  of  love,  he  suddenly  leaped 
to  eminence  as  one  of  the  master  poets  of  the 
world.  Two  characteristics  especially  distinguish 
the  Canzonierc  from  the  work  of  other  poets  :  the 
uniform  excellence  of  its  workmanship,  and  the 
minuteness  with  which  it  portrays  the  subtlest 
phases  of  emotion.  The  four  parts  of  which  it  is 
composed  differ  widely  in  tone  and  feeling ;  in- 
dividual poems  in  each  part  differ  equally  widely  in 
the  interest  of  their  subject-matter ;  but  in  beauty 
of  form,  in  delicacy  of  expression,  in  perfection  of 
melody,  there  is  no  distinction  between  its  earlier 
and  later  poems  ;  the  earliest-written  sonnet  of  the 
series — the  sonnet  numbered  XVI  in  the  ordinary 
editions — is,  technically  speaking,  a  model  which  no 


AVIGNON   AND    LAURA  39 

writer  of  sonnets  has  surpassed.  Partly  this  uni- 
formity of  skill  must  have  been  due  to  subsequent 
polishing,  for  Petrarch  had  the  habit  of  keeping  his 
works  by  him  and  constantly  making  alterations 
and  improvements  in  them  ;  but  it  is  only  work  of 
fine  quality  which  can  be  brought  to  perfection  by 
revision,  and  Petrarch's  sudden  leap  to  excellence 
must  have  been  mainly  due  to  the  influence  of  his 
love. 

Even  more  remarkable  is  the  other  distinguishing 
characteristic  of  the  Canzoniere.  Petrarch  has  been 
well  called  "  the  poet  of  the  heart  of  man  "  ;  human 
sentiment  is  his  theme,  and  from  the  abundance  of 
his  own  experience  he  draws  the  picture  of  all  its 
phases.  When  he  writes  of  the  external  world,  he 
deals  in  generalities,  for  its  aspects  are  matters  of 
secondary  interest  to  him  ;  it  is  on  the  delineation 
of  feeling,  from  the  fervour  of  indomitable  passion 
to  the  airiest  trick  of  graceful  fancy,  that  he  lavishes 
his  unrivalled  powers  of  analysis  and  expression. 

It  is  not  possible  within  the  limits  of  a  short 
biography  to  attempt  either  a  detailed  criticism  of 
the  Canzoniere,  or  a  minute  estimate  of  the  in- 
fluences which  helped  to  fashion  it,  and  of  its  own 
influence  on  the  development  of  European  litera- 
ture. Briefly  it  may  be  said  that,  while  in  matters 
of  form  and  phrase  Petrarch's  debt  to  the  Pro- 
vencals is  great,  the  temper  and  spirit  of  the  poems 
are  entirely  Italian.  The  "courtly"  forms  of  Pro- 
vencal lyric  lay  ready  to  his  hand  ;  so  did  a  stock  of 
phrases  which  for  three  centuries  had  been  the 
common   property  of  poets.     Of  these   he  availed 


40       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

himself  so  freely  that  critics  to  whom  form  seems 
the  all-important  thing  in  literature  may  with  some 
justification  go  near  to  accuse  him  of  plagiarism. 
But  those  who  judge  poetry  by  its  spirit  will  rightly 
maintain  that  the  Canzoniere  breathes  of  Italy. 
Cino's  influence  counted  for  more  in  the  making 
of  it  than  that  of  all  Provence ;  yet  even  Cino  and 
the  Tuscans  did  not  contribute  very  much  to  its 
essential  character.  It  is  the  mirror  of  its  author's 
soul,  and  that  soul  was  Italian. 

This  intensely  personal  character  of  the  Can- 
zoniere explains  its  failure  as  a  model.  Itself 
perhaps  the  most  exquisite  book  of  poetry  ever 
published,  it  gave  rise  to  one  of  the  feeblest  and 
most  tedious  schools  of  verse  that  have  afflicted 
the  world.  The  Petrarchists  could  imitate  their 
master's  tricks  of  diction  and  refine  wearisomely 
upon  his  "conceits";  but  they  could  not  catch  his 
spirit,  and  the  breath  of  life  was  not  in  them. 

A  brief  description  of  the  scheme  and  contents 
of  the  Canzoniere  may  be  of  service  to  those  who 
wish  to  make  closer  acquaintance  with  it.  The 
collection,  as  set  in  order  by  Petrarch  himself,  con- 
sists of  four  parts:  (i)  Sonnets  and  Songs  during 
the  life  of  Madonna  Laura ;  (2)  Sonnets  and  Songs 
after  her  death;  (3)  Triumphs  "in  vita  ed  in 
morte  "  ;  and  (4)  Poems  on  various  occasions.  The 
contents  of  Parts  I  and  II  are  sufficiently  described 
by  their  titles.  Part  I  consists  of  207  sonnets,  17 
odes,  8  "sestine,"  6  "ballate,"  and  4  madrigals,  in 
all  242  poems,  composed  between  the  6th  April, 
1327,  the  day  on  which  Petrarch  first  saw  Laura, 


AVIGNON   AND    LAURA  41 

and  the  6th  April,  1348,  the  day  of  her  death. 
Part  II  is  much  shorter;  it  contains  90  sonnets, 
8  odes,  I  "sestina,"  and  i  "ballata,"  exactly  100 
poems  in  all,  composed  after  Laura's  death,  and 
probably  before  1361,  the  third  critical  date  in 
Petrarch's  life,  after  which  he  seems  to  have  written 
little,  if  any,  Italian  poetry.  Part  III  contains  the 
Triumphs,  of  which  the  scope  and  object  are  well 
set  forth  by  Marsand  as  follow  :  "  The  poet's  aim 
in  composing  these  Triumphs  is  the  same  which  he 
proposed  to  himself  in  the  Canzoniere,  namely,  to 
return  in  thought  from  time  to  time  now  to  the 
beginning,  now  to  the  progress,  and  now  to  the 
end  of  his  passion,  taking  by  the  way  frequent 
opportunities  of  rendering  praise  and  honour  to  the 
single  and  exalted  object  of  his  love.  To  reach 
this  aim  he  devised  a  description  of  man  in  his 
various  conditions  of  life,  wherein  he  might  natur- 
ally find  occasion  to  speak  of  himself  and  of  his 
Laura.  Man  in  his  first  stage  of  youth  is  the  slave 
of  appetites,  which  may  all  be  included  under  the 
generic  name  of  Love  or  Self-Love.  But  as  he 
gains  understanding,  he  sees  the  impropriety  of 
such  a  condition,  so  that  he  strives  advisedly  against 
those  appetites  and  overcomes  them  by  means  of 
Chastity,  that  is,  by  denying  himself  the  opportunity 
of  satisfying  them.  Amid  these  struggles  and 
victories  Death  overtakes  him,  and  makes  victors 
and  vanquished  equal  by  taking  them  all  out  of  the 
world.  Nevertheless,  it  has  no  power  to  destroy 
the  memory  of  a  man,  who  by  illustrious  and 
honourable  deeds  seeks  to  survive  his  own  death. 


42        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Such  a  man  truly  lives  through  a  long  course  of 
ages  by  means  of  his  Fame.  But  Twte  at  length 
obliterates  all  memory  of  him,  and  he  finds  in  the 
last  resort  that  his  only  sure  hope  of  living  for  ever 
is  by  joy  in  God,  and  by  partaking  with  God  in  His 
blessed  Eternity.  Thus  Love  triumphs  over  Man, 
Chastity  over  Love,  and  Death  over  both  alike  ; 
Fame  triumphs  over  Death,  Time  over  Fame,  and 
Eternity  over  Time." 

Part  IV  consists  of  twenty  sonnets  and  four  odes 
written  on  various  occasions,  mostly  of  public  in- 
terest, and  contains  some  of  the  noblest  passages 
ever  inspired  in  the  soul  of  a  poet  by  the  fervour  of 
idealistic  patriotism.  Many  of  these  will  be  noticed 
in  connection  with  the  events  to  which  they  refer  ; 
here  it  is  enough  to  say  that  if  every  other  scrap  of 
Petrarch's  work  had  perished,  the  odes  Spirto  Gentil 
and  Italia  Mia  would  of  themselves  establish  his 
claim  to  rank  with  the  greatest  masters  of  lyric 
sonof. 


CHAPTER    III 

TRAVEL  AND   FRIENDSHIP 
1329-1336 

WE  have  no  record  of  the  two  years  following 
the  first  meeting  with  Laura ;  they  were 
probably  spent  in  Avignon,  and  we  may  confidently 
ascribe  to  them,  the  earliest  of  the  extant  poems. 
But  not  even  love  and  poetry  could  distract  Pet- 
rarch from  scholarship,  and  in  the  summer  of  1329 
he  undertook  the  first  of  many  journeys  in  which 
he  combined  the  delights  of  travel  and  sight-seeing 
with  a  diligent  hunt  for  forgotten  manuscripts  of 
the  classics.  This  passion  for  travel  for  the  love 
of  sight-seeing  is  one  of  the  many  minor  traits  in 
Petrarch's  character  which  mark  him  as  belonging 
rather  to  the  modern  than  the  mediceval  age ; 
throughout  the  Middle  Af^^es  men  travelled  far  and 
wide  on  errands  of  war,  of  diplomacy,  of  commerce, 
and  of  religion ;  but  Petrarch  may  fairly  be  called 
the  first  of  the  tourists.  Still  keener  was  his  passion 
for  book-hunting,  and  the  two  went  well  together. 
"  Whenever  I  took  a  far  journey,"  he  tells  us,  "  I 
would  turn  aside  to  any  old  monasteries  that  I 
chanced  to  see  in  the  distance,  saying:  'Who  knows 
whether  some  scrap  of  the  writings  I  covet  may 
not  lie  here  ? '     Thus  about  the  twenty-fifth  year  of 

43 


44       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

my  age,  in  the  course  of  a  hurried  journey  among 
the  Belgians  and  Swiss,  I  came  to  Liege,  and  hear- 
ing that  there  was  a  good  quantity  of  books  there, 
I  stayed  and  detained  my  companions  while  I 
copied  out  one  of  Cicero's  speeches  with  my  own 
hand  and  another  by  the  hand  of  a  friend,  which 
I  afterwards  published  throughout  Italy.  And  to 
give  you  a  laugh,  I  may  tell  you  that  in  this  fine 
barbaric  city  it  was  a  hard  matter  to  find  a  drop  of 
ink,  and  what  we  did  get  was  exactly  the  colour  of 
saffron." 

Meanwhile  stirring  events  had  happened  in  Italy. 
Lewis  of  Bavaria,  elected  King  of  the  Romans,  had 
invaded  the  land,  and  he  had  been  crowned  Emperor 
in  Rome,  first  by  the  Bishops  of  Venice  and  Ellera, 
and  then  again  by  an  Anti-Pope  whom  he  had  set 
up  in  the  Chair  of  St.  Peter.  As  the  death  of 
Henry  VII  quenched  the  last  spark  of  genuine 
Ghibellin  sentiment  in  Italy,  so  the  expedition  of 
"the  Bavarian,"  as  the  old  chroniclers  call  him  in 
scorn  and  hatred,  marks  the  acknowledged  end  of 
the  old  divisions.  From  the  day  when  Ghibellin 
Pisa  and  Milan  had  once  acted  in  concert  if  not  in 
alliance  with  Guelfic  Florence  and  Angevin  Naples 
to  oppose  the  invader,  the  old  names  had  become 
mere  badges,  still  worn  perhaps  for  custom  and 
tradition's  sake,  but  seen  of  all  men  to  be  empty  of 
significance.  The  old  rivalries  were  still  too  keen, 
the  old  feuds  too  bitter,  to  permit  of  lasting  union  ; 
the  ancient  enmities  broke  out  afresh  as  soon  as  the 
Bavarian  had  recrossed  the  Alps.  But  their  mere 
suspension  marks  a  new  phase  of  national  feeling. 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP         45 

When  Milan  and  Florence  had  enrafred  in  hostili- 

o     o 

ties  against  a  common  enemy,  and  that  enemy  a 
foreigner,  Italian  unity  had  ceased  to  be  a  mere 
dream.  Its  realisation  might  be  the  work  of  cen- 
turies, but  it  had  at  least  become  a  possible  aspira- 
tion of  practical  politicians. 

Prominent  among  the  Ghibellin  families  who  now 
rallied  to  the  Papacy  was  the  Roman  House  of 
Colonna,  and  it  was  a  young  Churchman  of  this 
House  who  accomplished  an  act  of  daring  which 
placed  Pope  John  XXII  deep  in  his  debt.  To  the 
pretensions  of  Lewis  and  his  Anti-Pope  John  replied 
by  a  Bull  of  Excommunication  against  them  both  ; 
this  Bull,  if  it  was  to  produce  its  full  dramatic  effect, 
must  be  openly  published  in  Rome  itself;  yet  its  publi- 
cation was  no  easy  matter,  for  the  Bavarian  held  the 
city,  and  a  troublesome  Papalist  ran  no  small  risk  of 
his  life.  The  risk  was  accepted  by  Giacomo  Colonna, 
youngest  son  of  old  Stefano,  the  head  of  the  House, 
who,  accompanied  by  four  masked  companions, 
publicly  read  the  Bull  of  Excommunication  and 
nailed  it  to  the  door  of  the  Church  of  San  Marcello. 
This  was  the  signal  for  a  popular  outbreak,  which 
presently  forced  the  Emperor  to  quit  Rome  and 
begin  the  retreat  which  ended  in  his  expulsion 
from  Italy.  So  conspicuous  a  service  merited  a 
signal  reward,  and  Giacomo,  though  under  the 
canonical  age,  received  the  bishopric  of  Lombez, 
a  village  near  the  source  of  the  Garonne  at  the  foot 
of  the  Pyrenees. 

Two  years  later,  in  the  summer  of  1330,  the 
young  Bishop  went  to  take  possession  of  his  see, 


46       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

and  with  him  went  Petrarch,  whom  he  had  known 
by  sight  only  as  a  fellow-student  at  Bologna.  It 
was  after  his  Roman  adventure  that  he  sought 
Petrarch  out  and  began  an  acquaintance  which 
soon  ripened  into  a  devoted  friendship. 

To  the  sojourn  at  Lombez  Petrarch  ever  after- 
wards looked  back  as  one  of  the  most  delightful 
episodes  in  his  life,  "a  summer  of  almost  heavenly 
bliss,"  of  which  the  mere  remembrance  made  him 
happy.  His  devotion  to  his  patron  was  deep  and  sin- 
cere ;  Giacomo's  brilliant  wit  and  sound  learning  were 
doubly  attractive  in  a  man  who,  though  a  priest, 
had  shown  the  qualities  of  a  soldier  and  a  courtier ; 
the  delicacy  of  his  nature  made  the  name  "patron" 
synonymous  with  "  friend,"  and  with  this  charm 
of  intellect  and  character  he  combined  an  earnest 
sense  of  duty  which  made  him  throw  himself  into 
the  affairs  of  his  petty  diocese  as  energetically  as 
into  the  great  drama  of  European  politics. 

Two  other  lifelong  friendships  were  the  fruit  of 
this  happy  visit.  Lello  Stefani,  the  "Lailius"  of  the 
letters,  was  a  Roman  of  noble  rank  though  not 
ancient  descent,  a  man  of  letters,  a  soldier,  and  a 
statesman,  attached  to  the  House  of  Colonna  not 
only  by  hereditary  ties,  but  by  bonds  of  affection 
so  strong  that  not  even  political  differences  in  that 
age  of  bitter  feuds  could  strain  them.  Very  happily 
chosen  was  the  name  of  "  Lsellus,"  suggested  no 
doubt  by  its  likeness  to  "  Lello,"  and  approved  as 
reminiscent  of  the  Lselil  and  the  Sciplos.  "  That 
name  of  note  among  old-world  friends  still  endures 
as  a  name  of   good  omen   to  friendships,"  wrote 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        47 

Petrarch  ;  "and  this  third  Lselius  is  my  second  self, 
nay,  rather  one  and  the  same  with  me." 

Dearer  even  than  Lailius,  dearest  indeed  of  all 
Petrarch's  friends,  was  the  young  Flemish  musician 
Lewis,  known  to  the  poet  and  his  circle  as  their 
Socrates.  "Thou  alone,  my  Socrates,  "writes  Petrarch 
twenty  years  later,  "wert  given  to  me  not,  as  the  rest 
of  my  friends,  by  the  land  of  Italy,  but  by  Annea 
Campineae,  so  that  the  poverty  of  thy  fatherland 
might  be  exalted  in  the  richness  of  thy  talent,  and 
Nature  assert  her  prerogative  of  fashioning  great 
souls  from  any  soil  and  under  every  sky.  There- 
fore to  my  profit  she  bore  thee,  a  man  of  such  parts, 
and  brought  thee  forth  at  the  very  time  when  I  was 
being  born  afar  off  in  another  sphere  of  the  world  ; 
and  although  thy  birth  made  thee  a  foreigner,  yet 
art  thou  become  more  than  half  Italian  by  the 
courtesy  of  thy  spirit,  by  the  intimacies  of  thy  life, 
and  especially  by  thy  love  for  me.  Marvellous  that 
in  men  born  so  far  apart  there  should  be  such 
neighbourhood  of  souls,  such  unity  of  wills,  as  have 
now  in  our  case  been  attested  by  the  witness  of 
twenty  years !  From  the  earnestness  of  thy  char- 
acter and  from  thy  sweet  pleasantness  we  chose 
thee  thy  surname ;  and  while  thy  supremacy  in  the 
art  of  music  might  have  persuaded  us  to  call  thee 
Aristoxenus,  the  better  judgment  of  thy  friends 
prevailed  in  naming  thee  our  Socrates."  A  volume 
might  be  filled  with  quotations  from  Petrarch, 
illustrating  the  depth  and  the  ardour  of  this  flaw- 
less friendship  :  to  Socrates  he  writes  every  pass- 
ing  thought   with    that    perfect   confidence    which 


48       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

reveals  the  small  things  of  life  as  readily  as  the 
great,  which  is  not  afraid  of  giving  undue  impor- 
tance to  trifles  nor  shy  of  opening  the  heart  on 
matters  of  the  gravest  moment,  but  utters  whatever 
is  uppermost  in  the  mind  without  reserve  and  with- 
out disguise,  in  the  happy  certainty  that  whatever 
interests  or  affects  the  speaker  will  equally  interest 
and  affect  the  hearer.  Petrarch  was  a  good  lover 
and  a  good  hater ;  in  all  his  friendships  we  are 
charmed  by  his  loyalty,  his  ardour,  and  his  most 
delightful  partiality ;  but  in  the  friendship  with 
Socrates  we  find  in  addition  a  tenderness  of 
sentiment,  a  lover-like  self-abandonment,  which 
distinguishes  it  in  kind  and  in  quality  from  all 
the  rest. 

In  mid-autumn  the  whole  party  returned  to 
Avignon,  and  Petrarch  took  up  his  residence  in  the 
house  of  Giacomo's  elder  brother,  the  Cardinal 
Giovanni  Colonna.  He  himself  would  have  pre- 
ferred to  remain  with  his  first  patron,  but  Giacomo 
judged  more  wisely  of  his  friend's  interest :  his  own 
career,  brilliantly  as  it  had  opened,  was  still  in  the 
making;  it  would  be  affected  by  the  accidents  of 
Roman  and  Papal  politics,  and  he  could  not  there- 
fore give  Petrarch  either  a  settled  home  or  the 
certainty  of  leisure  for  his  work.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  Cardinal's  position  was  assured :  three 
years  earlier,  while  still  a  young  man  under  thirty, 
he  had  received  the  highest  dignity  of  the  Church 
short  of  the  Papacy  itself,  and  the  great  influence 
which  any  Cardinal  of  his  House  would  inevitably 
possess  was  heightened  in  his  case  by  the  elevation 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        49 

of  his  character,  by  his  blameless  life,  and  by  his 
reputation  for  independence  in  speech  and  action. 
Moreover,  his  house  at  Avignon  was  the  centre 
of  learned  and  polite  society.  He  prized  his  posi- 
tion as  a  patron  of  letters,  and  would  fully  appre- 
ciate the  fact  of  which  Petrarch  himself  seemed 
charmingly  unconscious,  that  his  protege's  reputation 
as  a  scholar  and  a  poet  would  add  to  the  distinction 
of  his  household,  and  amply  repay  him  for  his 
hospitality. 

For  the  next  sixteen  years  their  personal  relations 
were  of  the  pleasantest,  and  even  after  Petrarch's 
political  adhesion  to  Rienzi  had  made  it  impossible 
for  him  to  be  the  intimate  associate  of  a  Colonna, 
he  still  wrote  to  the  Cardinal  in  terms  of  unabated 
respect  and  gratitude.  Probably  he  never  felt  for 
him  quite  the  same  ardour  of  brotherly  love  which 
Giacomo  had  inspired  in  him.  But  he  revered  him 
as  "a  man  of  the  utmost  goodness  and  innocence 
of  heart,  far  beyond  the  wont  of  cardinals."  He 
was  attached  to  him  by  ties  of  intellectual  sympathy 
and  community  of  tastes,  and  the  friendship  be- 
tween them  was  so  close  that  Petrarch  could  declare 
that  in  the  Cardinal's  household  he  "lived  many 
years,  not  as  under  a  master,  but  as  under  a  father ; 
nay,  rather  as  with  a  most  loving  brother,  or  still 
more  truly  as  with  himself,  and  in  his  own  house." 
A  little  incident  which  happened  while  Petrarch 
was  an  inmate  of  the  house  throws  so  interestino-  a 

o 

light,  alike  on  the  personal  relations  between  the 
two  men  and  on  domestic  discipline  in  the  four- 
teenth century,  that  it  is  worth  quoting  at  length 

E 


50       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

in  spite  of  its  triviality.  "You  may  remember," 
Petrarch  wrote  some  years  later  to  the  Cardinal, 
"  how  there  was  once  a  serious  quarrel  among  some 
of  your  people,  and  blows  were  struck,  at  which  you 
were  so  justly  incensed  that  you  sat  down  as  it 
were  on  a  judgment-seat,  and  calling  your  household 
together,  administered  an  oath  to  each  one  of  them, 
binding  them  to  speak  the  truth.  Even  your 
brother  Agapito,  Bishop  of  Luni,  had  sworn,  and  I 
was  just  stretching  out  my  hand,  when  in  the  full  tide 
of  your  anger  you  drew  back  the  Gospels,  and  in  the 
hearing  of  them  all  declared  that  you  were  satisfied 
with  my  simple  word.  And  to  make  it  clear  that 
you  never  regretted  your  action,  and  that  the  kind- 
ness of  it  was  not  unpremeditated,  whenever  similar 
incidents  occurred,  as  they  often  did,  you  never 
allowed  me  to  be  sworn,  though  all  the  rest  were 
bound  by  oath." 

In  the  Cardinal's  house  Petrarch  had  the  happi- 
ness of  still  living  with  Socrates,  and  for  a  time 
with  Laelius  too ;  he  also  found  installed  there  two 
friends,  the  soldier  Mainardo  Accursio  of  Florence, 
and  the  Churchman  Luca  Cristiano  of  Piacenza, 
with  whom  he  lived  thenceforward  on  terms  of 
closest  intimacy.  He  had  certainly  known  Luca 
and  possibly  Mainardo  also  at  Bologna,  but  it  was 
at  Avignon  that  the  acquaintance  ripened  into  so 
affectionate  a  friendship  that  Petrarch  could  write 
of  it  to  Socrates:  "The  four  of  us  had  but  one 
mind.  .  .  .  Where  could  you  find  a  kindlier  spirit 
than  our  Luca  or  a  more  genial  comrade  than 
Mainardo  ?     The  former,  indeed,  wsls  so  formed  in 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP         51 

mind  as  to  be  not  only  the  sweetest  and  brightest 
of  housemates,  but  also  the  sharer  and  companion 
of  our  studies  ;  while  the  latter,  though  unpractised 
in  matters  of  this  sort,  was  abundantly  furnished 
with  the  qualities  which  are  the  object  of  such 
studies,  to  wit  with  courtesy,  faith,  liberality,  and 
constancy  of  mind.  In  a  word,  though  untrained 
in  the  liberal  arts,  he  had  learned  to  be  a  good  man 
and  a  good  friend,  and  it  was  better  for  us  to  have 
one  such  in  our  band,  than  for  us  all  to  be  devoted 
to  scholarship  and  negligent  of  everything  else." 
Mainardo  has  generally  been  identified  with  the 
Olympius  of  the  letters,  but  some  recent  critics 
ascribe  the  name  to  Luca ;  the  point  Is  a  doubtful 
one,  and  the  safe  course  is  to  speak  of  both  friends 
by  their  real  names.  Both  of  them,  Petrarch  de- 
clares, knew  every  thought  of  his  heart  as  he  knew 
theirs,  and  many  years  later  he  gave  a  practical 
proof  of  his  affection  for  Luca  by  resigning  a 
canonry  at  Modena  in  his  favour. 

Petrarch  was  fortunate  too  in  his  relations  with 
the  whole  Colonna  family.  Stefano  the  Elder,  at 
this  time  on  a  visit  to  his  son  the  Cardinal,  treated 
him  from  the  first  like  one  of  his  own  sons.  There 
must  have  been  a  peculiarly  winning  charm  in  the 
poet's  character,  which  throughout  his  life  made 
him  the  friend  and  confidant  rather  than  the  de- 
pendent of  his  patrons.  In  his  presence  the  sternest 
character  grew  gentle,  and  the  stiffest  neck  bowed 
willingly  to  the  yoke  of  affection,  so  that  to  him 
Azzo  da  Correo"'io  was  sincere  and  Bernabo 
Visconti  courteous.     And  old  Stefano,  the  man  of 


52       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

antique  mould,  who  "  looked  like  Julius  Caesar  or 
Africanus  come  back  in  the  flesh,  but  for  his  great 
age,"  who  was  "the  bravest  and  stoutest  man  of 
our  time  in  confronting  a  foe,  though  so  loving  to 
his  family  that  he  seemed  wrapped  up  in  their  life," 
Stefano,  whose  fierce  triumphs  and  bitter  sufferings 
in  his  struorcrle  with  Boniface  VIII  seemed  to  have 
hardened  body  and  soul  in  him  to  iron,  became  all 
gentleness  in  his  intercourse  with  Petrarch,  confided 
to  him  with  tears  the  forebodings  of  his  heart  as  to 
the  fate  that  awaited  his  family,  and  granted  to  his 
intercession  what  he  had  refused  to  many  other 
friends,  the  pardon  of  one  of  his  sons  with  whom  he 
had  had  a  bitter  quarrel.  Such  confidence  and 
kindness  from  one  so  stern  and  unbending  to  most 
men  made  a  deep  impression  on  Petrarch,  whose 
sensibility  was  a  prominent  element  in  his  disposi- 
tion, and  he  always  speaks  of  Stefano  as  "a  man  of 
unique  character,  to  be  regarded  with  mingled  awe 
and  admiration." 

Much  more  familiar  was  his  intercourse  with 
Stefano's  brother,  Giovanni  Colonna  di  San  Vito ; 
he  too  had  played  a  brave  part  in  the  struggle  with 
Boniface  VIII,  but  he  was  not  cast  in  his  brother's 
iron  mould ;  exile  and  hardship  and  the  gout  had 
done  much  to  break  his  spirit,  and  he  was  now  an 
amiable  but  rather  querulous  old  man,  who  con- 
ceived an  extraordinary  affection  for  Petrarch,  and 
treated  him  like  a  friend  of  his  own  age.  For  his 
diversion  Petrarch  wrote  a  comedy,  which  he  after- 
wards burnt,  and  after  Giovanni's  departure  from 
Avignon  at  the   end   of   1331   wrote  him  several 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP         53 

letters,  as  well  as  a  humorous  fable  called  The  Spider 
and  the  Gout. 

Cardinal  Colonna's  house  was  Petrarch's  home 
for  nearly  seven  years,  and  here  he  had  opportuni- 
ties of  meeting-  the  many  distinguished  men  from 
all  parts  of  Europe,  who  came  on  errands  of  busi- 
ness or  of  diplomacy  to  the  Papal  Court.  Among 
others  he  became  acquainted  with  the  celebrated 
Richard  de  Bury,  Bishop  of  Durham  in  1333,  and 
soon  afterwards  Chancellor  and  Lord  High  Treas- 
urer of  England,  who  was  entrusted  by  Edward  HI 
with  no  less  than  three  diplomatic  missions  to  the 
Pope.  On  either  the  first  or  the  second  of  these 
Petrarch  met  him,  and  had  a  discussion  with  him 
on  the  site  of  the  Island  of  Thule.  He  describes 
the  author  of  Philobiblon  as  a  man  of  brilliant 
talents  and  good  knowledge  of  letters,  from  his 
youth  up  curious  to  an  incredible  degree  in  abstruse 
questions,  and  already  possessed  of  one  of  the  finest 
libraries  in  the  world  ;  a  description  which  tallies 
well  enough  with  the  received  estimate  of  Richard 
as  a  brilliant  dilettante  and  amateur  of  literature, 
rather  than  a  profound  and  serious  scholar. 

To  this  period  undoubtedly  belong  a  great  many 
of  the  Italian  poems,  and  from  them  we  may  infer 
that  Laura  was  resident  in  Avignon,  and  that  her 
poet  had  frequent  opportunities  of  meeting  her. 
To  this  period  also  belongs  the  Latin  poetical  letter 
to  Enea  Tolomei  of  Siena,  called  forth  by  King 
John  of  Bohemia's  visit  to  Avignon  and  subsequent 
descent  into  Italy.  John  had  first  invaded  Italy  in 
1330   as   the   ally    of   Lewis   of   Bavaria,  but   the 


54       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

latter,  suspecting  him  of  fighting  for  his  own  hand, 
had  picked  a  quarrel  with  him  and  instigated  a 
rising  against  him  in  Bohemia.  John  left  his  son 
Charles,  a  lad  of  sixteen,  in  nominal  command  of 
his  Italian  army,  hastened  home,  and  soon  restored 
order  in  his  own  kingdom.  Then,  beinsf  still  eaofer 
to  further  his  Italian  projects,  he  turned  to  Philip 
of  France,  and  so  began  the  alliance  which  eventu- 
ally brought  him  to  his  death  at  Crdcy.  Philip, 
ever  ready  to  fish  in  troubled  waters  and  sure  that 
in  the  event  of  success  he  would  get  the  lion's 
share  of  the  plunder,  agreed  to  help  John  with  a 
large  force ;  and  to  give  some  colour  of  justification 
to  their  enterprise,  these  royal  filibusters  agreed 
that  John  should  go  to  Avignon  and  obtain  the 
Pope's  sanction.  Once  more  Italian  patriotism  was 
roused  against  the  foreigner,  once  more  old  enemies 
sank  their  differences  and  formed  a  temporary 
league  against  the  Franco- Bohemian  invaders;  and 
Petrarch,  burning  with  indignant  zeal,  wrote  that 
letter  to  Tolomei  which  is  the  Latin  counterpart  of 
the  noble  ode  Italia  Mia,  written  long  afterwards 
at  a  time  of  even  sorer  trouble  to  Italy.  In  both 
poems  we  feel  the  purity  and  strength  of  his  love 
for  Italy  and  the  loftiness  of  his  political  idealismi, 
and,  what  is  perhaps  even  more  remarkable,  in 
the  Latin  letter  we  find  Petrarch  the  enthusiast,  the 
poet,  some  would  say  the  visionary,  going  straight 
to  the  heart  of  the  matter  and  laying  his  finger 
unerringly  on  the  real  practical  cause  of  the  mis- 
chief. Others  might  be  misled  by  appearances — 
even  so  shrewd  a  writer  as  the  chronicler  Giovanni 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        55 

Villani  speaks  of  John  as  Italy's  chief  enemy — but 
Petrarch,  though  as  yet  little  versed  in  practical 
politics,  detects  Philip  as  the  real  culprit,  and, 
neglecting  the  Bohemians,  directs  the  whole  force 
of  his  invective  against  the  French. 

The  Italian  league  was  soon  successful.  John 
lost  Pavia  to  Azzo  Visconti,  and  the  French  army 
was  soon  afterwards  annihilated  before  Ferrara,  so 
that  by  the  month  of  October,  1333,  the  King  was 
forced  to  return  to  Bohemia,  and  in  the  words  of  an 
old  writer,  "the  fame  of  him  vanished  like  smoke 
from  the  plains  of  Lombardy."  Meanwhile  Petrarch 
had  set  out  on  a  journey  to  Paris.  Probably  the 
Pope's  action  in  secretly  encouraging  the  invasion 
of  Italy,  while  pretending  to  discourage  it,  had 
intensified  his  dislike  of  the  Papal  Court,  and  the 
unsuccessful  course  of  his  love  for  Laura  may  have 
made  him  restless  and  dissatisfied.  He  was  certainly 
eager  for  sight-seeing,  and  persuaded  the  Cardinal, 
though  with  some  difficulty,  to  let  him  go  on  a 
foreign  tour.  In  Paris  he  souoht  out  the  Aucjus- 
tinian  friar  Dionigi  of  Borgo  San  Sepolcro,  who 
was  lecturing  at  the  University  on  Philosophy  and 
Theology.  Dionigi  was  a  man  of  deep  piety  and 
unusual  learning,  a  theologian  of  scholarly  sym- 
pathies, and  a  friend  to  whom  Petrarch  could 
confide  all  the  troubles  of  his  heart.  Probably  he 
took  him  for  his  confessor ;  certainly  he  sought  his 
advice  about  his  love  for  Laura.  Dionigi  showed 
keen  insight  into  the  character  of  his  penitent.  He 
judged  that  spiritual  zeal  would  be  for  him  the  best 
antidote  to  an  earthly  passion,  and  showed  an  even 


56       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

more  remarkable  grasp  of  his  moral  and  intellectual 
temperament  by  directing  his  attention  not  to  the 
more  ascetic  of  the  fathers,  but  to  the  liberal  and 
cultured  Augustine.  Petrarch  already  knew  and 
possessed  the  De  Civitate  Dei ;  Dionigi  now  gave 
him  a  copy  of  the  Confessions^  which  Petrarch  ever 
afterwards  carried  about  with  him  in  all  his  journeys. 
Predisposed  as  he  was  to  admire  St.  Augustine,  it 
is  nevertheless  from  his  intimacy  with  Fra  Dionigi 
that  we  must  date  the  passionate  enthusiasm  of  hero- 
worship  which  henceforward  inspired  him  with  the 
same  feeling  for  Augustine  as  his  spiritual  guide 
that  he  already  felt  for  Cicero  as  his  master  in 
literature.  From  this  intimacy  too  dates  the  de- 
velopment in  Petrarch  of  a  devotional  impulse 
which  henceforth  shared  the  empire  of  his  soul  with 
his  zeal  for  learning.  He  has  now  two  ideals,  those 
of  the  scholar  and  of  the  saint,  and  occasionally, 
though  not  very  often,  the  two  ideals  clash  in 
violent  spiritual  conflict.  In  such  moments  of  agony 
— for  to  Petrarch's  sensitive  nature  the  strife  was 
nothing  less  than  agony — he  is  possessed  with 
ascetic  fervour,  and  for  a  moment  condemns  all 
earthly  aims  as  vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit ;  but 
this  was  not  his  normal  temper  ;  it  was  only  at  rare 
and  brief  intervals  that  he  lost  sight  of  the  nobler 
conception  of  the  scholar  who  is  also  a  saint. 

"You  tell  me,"  he  writes  in  answer  to  a  banter- 
ing accusation  from  Giacomo  Colonna,  "that  I  do 
but  affect  a  reverence  for  Augustine  and  his  works, 
while  really  I  have  never  torn  myself  away  from 
the  poets  and  philosophers.    And  why,  pray,  should 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP         57 

I  tear  myself  away  from  those  to  whom  you  can  see 
that  Augustine  himself  clung  close  ? "  Again  he 
asserts  that  Cicero's  writings,  "though  diverse  from 
Christianity,  are  never  adverse  to  it,"  and  that  the 
ofreat  classical  authors  are  full  of  sentiments  in 
harmony  with  the  Christian  spirit.  And  when 
Boccaccio  was  momentarily  thrown  off  his  balance 
by  a  supposed  revelation  commanding  him  to  re- 
nounce poetry  and  scholarship,  Petrarch  could 
reassure  him  by  a  letter  containing  some  of  the 
noblest  passages  ever  written  on  the  right  relation 
of  literature  to  religion.  And  the  point  which  chiefly 
attracts  him  in  the  De  Civitate  Dei  is  that  Augustine 
"  could  base  it  on  a  great  foundation  of  philosophers 
and  poets,  and  adorn  it  with  all  the  colours  of  the 
orators  and  historians." 

Far  more  violent  and  far  more  constant  was  the 
struggle  between  spiritual  devotion  and  earthly  love. 
The  latter  was,  indeed,  too  strong  a  feeling  to  be 
overcome  by  any  concurrent  emotion,  but  henceforth 
at  least  **  it  no  longer  held  sole  possession  of  the 
spirit's  chamber,  but  found  there  another  sentiment 
fighting  and  striving  against  it."  It  is  just  this  strife 
of  conflictincr  emotions  that  calls  forth  our  liveliest 
sympathy.  Doubtless  the  steadfast  man  who  marches 
to  his  end  with  never  a  stumble  by  the  way  is  a 
heroic  figure,  but  our  tears  flow  and  our  hearts  are 
wi-ung  rather  for  the  sensitive  soul  responsive  to 
every  impression,  and  battered  by  the  storm  of 
opposing  passions,  which  nevertheless  through  error 
and  through  pain  achieves  its  escape  as  through 
Vanity    Fair   and   the    Valley   of   the    Shadow   of 


58       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Death  to  the  Delectable  Mountains  and  the  peace 
of  Beulah. 

In  Paris  he  "spent  a  long  time,  exploring  it 
thoroughly  from  a  wish  to  see  everything,  and  to 
discover  whether  all  its  reputed  glories  were  real  or 
imaginary,  and,  when  daylight  often  failed,  making 
use  of  the  night  as  well."  Next  he  visited  Ghent, 
"which,  like  Paris,  boasts  of  Julius  Caesar  as  its 
founder,  and  all  the  other  peoples  of  Flanders  and 
Brabant,  whose  trade  is  the  preparation  of  wool  and 
weaving."  Thence  he  went  to  Li^ge,  "a  place 
noted  for  its  clergy,"  which  he  had  already  visited 
four  years  previously,  and  to  Aix-la-Chapelle,  where 
some  priests  of  the  cathedral  showed  him  in  MS.  a 
legend  of  Charlemagne  and  the  foundation  of  the 
city.  From  Aix,  after  taking  the  baths,  "which 
are  warm  like  those  of  Baiae,"  he  went  to  Cologne, 
"situated  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Rhine,  a  place 
which  may  well  be  proud  of  its  position,  its  river, 
and  its  people.  Marvellous  was  it  in  a  barbaric 
land  to  find  so  advanced  a  civilization,  so  beautiful 
a  city,  such  dignity  in  the  men,  and  such  comeliness 
in  the  women."  By  good  luck  he  arrived  on  St. 
John's  Eve,  and  witnessed  a  picturesque  local  cere- 
mony performed  on  that  day.  And,  by  a  further 
stroke  of  good  fortune,  which  shows  how  widely 
his  fame  as  a  poet  was  already  spread,  he  found 
friends  in  the  place,  with  whom  he  could  converse 
in  Latin,  and  who  could  give  him  an  explanation  of 
what  he  saw.  About  sunset  "the  whole  bank  of 
the  river  was  covered  with  a  brilliant  and  vast 
concourse  of  women.    Good  heavens!    What  beauty 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        59 

of  form,  feature,  and  dress !  One  whose  heart  was 
not  already  engaged  might  well  have  been  smitten 
with  love.  I  stood  on  a  spot  of  rising-  ground, 
from  which  I  could  attend  to  all  that  was  going  on. 
There  was  a  wonderful  throng  without  any  disturb- 
ance ;  and  each  in  her  turn  the  women,  some  of 
whom  were  girdled  with  sweet-scented  herbs, 
hastened  to  turn  their  sleeves  above  the  elbow  and 
wash  their  white  hands  and  arms  in  the  current, 
murmuring  some  soft  words  in  their  foreign  tongue. 
.  .  .  Understanding  nothing  of  the  ceremony,  I 
asked  one  of  my  friends  in  a  quotation  from  Virgil — 
'  What  means  this  concourse  at  the  river's  bank  ? 
What  seek  the  souls  here  gathered  ? ' 

And  he  answered  that  this  was  a  very  old  national 
custom,  the  women,  especially  among  the  common 
people,  believing  that  all  the  impending  misfortune 
of  a  whole  year  is  washed  away  by  this  day's 
ablution,  and  that  henceforth  better  fortune  succeeds. 
At  which  I  smiled  and  said,  *  O  too  happy  dwellers 
by  the  Rhine,  if  all  your  miseries  are  purged  by 
him !  Neither  Po  nor  Tiber  has  ever  availed  to 
wash  away  ours.  You  pass  on  your  evils  down  the 
Rhine  to  the  Britons,  and  willingly  would  we  send 
ours  to  the  Africans  and  Illyrians  ;  but  our  streams, 
it  would  seem,  are  too  sluggish.'  At  this  they  all 
laughed,  and  at  last,  late  in  the  evening,  we  left  the 
riverside." 

At  Cologne  he  was  greatly  interested  in  "  the 
illustrious  monuments  of  Roman  greatness,"  and  in 
the  association  of  the  place  with  Agrippa  and 
Augustus.     He   saw    "the    Capitol,  the    image   of 


6o       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

ours,  except  that  in  place  of  the  Senate,  which 
there  debated  questions  of  peace  and  war,  here  a 
mixed  choir  of  comely  lads  and  maidens  sings 
nightly  praises  to  God  ";  he  also  saw  "the  beautiful, 
though  yet  unfinished,  church  in  the  midst  of  the 
town,  which  they  rightly  call  their  high  church, 
and  in  which  lie  the  bodies  of  the  Magi  Kings, 
brought  by  three  stages  from  East  to  West."  On 
the  last  day  of  June  he  left  Cologne,  and  gave  proof 
of  his  courage,  not  to  say  rashness,  by  venturing  to 
travel  alone,  unarmed,  and  in  time  of  war  through 
the  forest  of  the  Ardennes,  which  he  found  "a 
dismal  and  weird  country,"  but  which  inspired  him 
to  write  the  beautiful  sonnet  Per  mezz'  i  boschi. 
At  length,  "after  compassing  many  a  large  tract  of 
country,"  he  came  on  the  8th  of  August  to  Lyons, 
"another  noble  colony  of  the  Romans,  and  a  little 
older  than  Cologne  "  ;  and  to  his  transports  at  the 
sight  of  the  Rhone  we  owe  the  sonnet  Millepiagge, 
Here  he  fell  in  with  one  of  Cardinal  Colonna's 
servants,  who  gave  him  news  which  decided  him  to 
rest  a  few  days  in  Lyons,  and  then  go  quietly  on  to 
Avignon  by  boat. 

Giacomo  Colonna  had  for  some  time  past  been 
planning  a  visit  to  Rome,  and  had  promised  to  take 
Petrarch  with  him.  To  see  Rome,  and  especially 
to  see  it  in  his  friend's  company,  was  one  of  the 
poet's  dearest  wishes,  and  he  was  hurrying  back  to 
Avignon  in  the  hope  that  they  might  make  the 
journey  together  in  the  course  of  the  autumn,  when 
he  heard  from  the  Cardinal's  servant  that  Giacomo 
and  Lselius  had  already  started  without  waiting,  as 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        6i 

had  been  expressly  agreed,  for  his  return.  Bitterly 
disappointed,  he  wrote  to  Giacomo  to  reproach  him 
for  his  breach  of  faith,  the  cause  of  which  he  could 
not  conjecture.  But  on  arriving  at  Avignon,  he 
learnt  that  family  affairs  of  great  importance  had 
required  the  Bishop's  immediate  presence  in  Rome. 
Some  years  previously  the  perpetual  quarrels  of 
the  Colonna  and  the  Orsini  families  had  been  sus- 
pended by  a  truce,  the  term  of  which  expired  this 
summer.  The  Pope,  unable  to  bring  about  a  last- 
ing reconciliation,  issued  a  Bull  on  the  3rd  of  June 
prolonging  this  truce  for  a  year,  but  it  was  already 
too  late.  In  May  the  Orsini,  headed  by  Bertoldo, 
the  bravest  and  most  popular  of  their  chiefs, 
entrapped  Stefano  Colonna  the  Younger  into  an 
ambush,  where  they  attacked  him  with  greatly 
superior  forces.  But  Stefano  and  his  party,  though 
outnumbered  and  taken  by  surprise,  fought  so 
gallantly  that  they  won  a  complete  victory,  routing 
the  Orsini  and  killing  Bertoldo  and  his  cousin 
Francesco.  Such  at  least  was  the  story  as  told 
and  believed  in  Cardinal  Colonna's  household,  and 
the  Pope's  subsequent  action  seems  to  confirm  its 
truth,  in  spite  of  Villani's  assertion  that  Stefano 
Colonna  was  the  author  of  the  ambush.  Often  as 
the  rival  houses  had  engaged  In  similar  affrays,  this 
was  the  first  occasion  on  which  any  of  their  chiefs 
had  been  killed,  and  the  affair  created  an  immense 
sensation  in  Rome  and  Avignon.  The  Orsini, 
aided  by  their  relative  Cardinal  Poggetto,  the  Papal 
Legate,  were  eager  to  avenge  their  defeat,  and  it 
was    to    counteract    their   schemes   that   Giacomo 


62        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

started  in  such  haste  for  Rome.  Probably  through 
his  influence  and  that  of  Cardinal  Giovanni,  the 
Pope  was  persuaded  to  administer  a  severe  rebuke 
to  his  Legate,  and  the  House  of  Colonna  main- 
tained for  the  time  its  superiority  over  its  rivals. 
Petrarch,  who  as  yet  knew  nothing  of  Roman 
politics  but  what  he  heard  from  his  patrons,  of 
course  shared  their  gratification,  and  addressed  a 
stirring  sonnet  to  Stefano  the  Younger,  exhorting 
him  to  avoid  the  error  of  Hannibal,  who  conquered 
at  Cannse,  but  failed  to  follow  up  his  victory.  With 
this  sonnet,  which  was  written  in  Italian  that  the 
Colonna  men-at-arms  might  understand  it,  he  sent 
a  Latin  letter  to  Stefano  to  the  same  effect,  and 
also  composed  a  Latin  poem  made  up  of  original 
lines  and  quotations  placed  alternately,  which,  how- 
ever, he  destroyed  on  finding  that  others  had  anti- 
cipated him  in  this  queer  method  of  composition. 

Much  as  he  rejoiced  in  the  victory  of  his  patrons, 
he  was  still  more  elated  by  the  news,  which  he 
also  heard  on  reaching  Avignon,  that  King  Philip 
of  France  had  eng-ao^ed  to  lead  a  new  Crusade, 
and  that  the  Pope  had  announced  his  intention 
of  bringing  back  the  Papacy  to  Italy.  To  him, 
as  to  all  devout  men  of  his  age,  it  seemed  a  shame- 
ful and  horrible  thing  that  the  holy  places  should 
be  in  the  possession  of  unbelievers,  and  that 
Christian  princes  and  states  should  turn  their  arms 
one  against  another,  instead  of  combining  to  rescue 
the  cradle  of  the  faith  from  Saracen  domination. 
In  spite  of  the  failure  of  all  previous  Crusades,  he 
seems  to  have  had  no  doubt  that  success  was  now 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        63 

possible  and  even  easy,  if  only  the  effort  were 
sincerely  made ;  and  the  hope  inspired  him  to 
address  to  Giacomo  Colonna  the  ode  O  aspettata 
in  del,  in  which  he  exhorts  the  Bishop  to  employ 
his  great  influence  and  his  unrivalled  eloquence  in 
rousing  the  sons  of  Italy  to  take  their  part  in  the 
glorious  enterprise.  John  XXII's  proposal  to  return 
to  Rome,  which  he  regarded  as  the  only  rightful 
seat  of  the  Papacy,  stirred  him  to  yet  higher  en- 
thusiasm. Thus  it  seemed  to  him  that  Christendom 
now  bade  fair  to  escape  from  two  of  the  chief  evils 
that  afflicted  the  age,  and  the  double  hope  is  finely 
expressed  in  the  sonnet  //  successor  di  Carlo,  in 
which  he  urges  the  Princes  of  Italy  to  assist  King 
and  Pope  in  their  endeavours.  Philip,  who  but  a 
few  months  since  seemed  to  be  Italy's  worst  enemy, 
can  now  be  honoured  with  the  title  of  "successor  to 
Charlemagne";  and  when  "the  Vicar  of  Christ, 
returning  to  his  nest,  sees  first  Bologna  and  then 
our  noble  Rome,"  Italy,  the  gentle  lamb,  will  rise 
and  smite  the  fierce  wolves  that  have  torn  her.  So 
perish  all  who  sow  dissension  betwixt  hearts  that 
love  should  bind  !  Disappointment  soon  succeeded 
to  hope  ;  King  Philip  took  the  cross  indeed,  but 
with  it  received  from  the  Pope  the  right  to  levy 
a  tithe  on  the  revenues  of  the  Gallican  Church,  and 
with  the  grant  in  his  hands  he  soon  dropped  the 
pretext  of  crusading  zeal  on  which  he  had  obtained 
it.  The  Pope  kept  up  appearances  a  little  longer, 
and  the  Cardinal  Les^ate  was  ordered  to  build  a 
palace  at  Bologna  for  his  reception  on  his  way  to 
Rome,     Presently,   however,   the   palace  took   the 


64       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

form  of  a  fortress  commanding  the  city,   and  the 
Pope  too  had  got  what  he  wanted  by  his  pretext. 

He  died  in  the  following  year  at  the  age  of 
ninety-one  ;  he  had  been  Pope  eighteen  years,  and 
had  amassed  eighteen  million  lire  in  specie,  as  well 
as  plate,  gems,  and  ornaments  to  the  value  of  seven 
millions  more.  He  was  not  a  great  or  a  good  Pope, 
and  as  a  theologian  he  nearly  split  the  Church  by 
propounding  an  unorthodox  opinion  on  the  Beatific 
Vision.  But  he  must  have  had  some  good  qualities 
of  head  and  heart,  for  though  he  remained  at  Avig- 
non, he  was  shrewd  enough  to  appreciate  the  value 
of  the  Roman  tradition,  and  he  won  the  friendship  of 
so  upright  a  man  as  Cardinal  Colonna,  who,  as  Pet- 
rarch tells  us,  loved  the  man  though  not  his  errors. 
The  Conclave  which  followed  was  a  hotbed  of 
intrigue ;  the  French  party  was  the  strongest,  but 
the  Italians,  though  unable  to  carry  a  candidate  of 
their  own,  could  prevent  any  one  whom  they  disliked 
from  obtaining  the  requisite  two-thirds  majority. 
To  gain  time,  the  Frenchmen  put  forward  Cardinal 
Fournier,  the  least  influential  member  of  the  College ; 
but  when  the  scrutiny  was  taken,  it  was  found  that 
every  one  had  voted  for  Fournier  in  the  belief  that 
only  a  few  others  would  do  so,  and  he  was  declared 
unanimously  elected.  The  new  Pope  himself  was 
more  astonished  than  any  one  at  the  result,  and  is 
said  to  have  exclaimed,  '*  Your  choice  has  fallen  on 
an  ass."  He  took  the  name  of  Benedict  XII.  The 
election  of  a  Frenchman  was,  of  course,  distasteful 
to  Petrarch,  but  it  was  not  long  before  Benedict 
showed    him    marks    of    personal    friendship    and 


THK    -MOXUMKXT   OF    I'Ol'K    lOIIN    XXll.    .WKIXON 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        65 

esteem  :  he  allowed  Petrarch  to  address  him  in  a 
poetical  Latin  letter  urging  the  return  of  the  Papacy 
to  Rome,  and  though  he  never  yielded  either  to  this 
or  to  subsequent  appeals  of  the  same  kind,  he  was 
certainly  not  displeased  at  them,  for  he  presently 
conferred  on  their  author  his  first  ecclesiastical  pre- 
ferment, a  canonry  at  Lombez. 

Soon  afterwards  began  Petrarch's  friendship  with 
Azzo  da  Correggio,  one  of  those  friendships  with 
Italian  despots  which  have  puzzled  some  of  his 
admirers  and  scandalised  many  of  his  critics.  How, 
it  is  asked,  could  Petrarch,  with  the  praises  of 
virtue  and  fidelity  always  on  his  lips,  seek  the 
society  and  extol  the  merits  of  men  steeped  in 
crime,  to  whom  treachery  and  assassination  were 
mere  moves  in  a  game  of  political  intrigue,  and 
whose  reputation  for  cruelty  and  lust  is  the  blackest 
spot  in  the  record  of  the  Italian  people  ?  With 
many  members  of  these  ruling  families  Petrarch 
lived  on  terms  of  intimate  acquaintance ;  to  three 
of  them,  namely,  to  Azzo  da  Correggio  and  to 
Jacopo  and  Francesco  da  Carrara,  he  was  bound 
by  ties  of  warmest  friendship.  How  was  this  pos- 
sible ?  The  easy  explanation  and  the  false  one  is 
that  Petrarch  was  a  hypocrite  and  a  sycophant. 
The  truth  is  less  easily  stated,  and  to  men  of  our 
age  and  country  will  never  be  fully  comprehensible. 
In  the  first  place,  it  must  be  remembered  that  until 
the  researches  of  comparatively  recent  historians 
shed  a  flood  of  light  on  the  period  from  the 
thirteenth  to  the  sixteenth  centuries,  history  had 
given  a  one-sided  account  of  these  Italian  despots. 

F 


66       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

The  world  was  so  shocked  at  their  unspeakable 
crimes  that  it  forgot  their  equally  extraordinary- 
merits.  Numbers  of  them  were  men  of  the  most 
brilliant  intellectual  gifts,  lovers  of  literature,  appre- 
ciative patrons  of  art,  gallant  in  war,  splendid  and 
usually  generous  in  peace.  They  were,  to  use  a 
modern  catchword,  strenuous  men  in  every  depart- 
ment of  life.  Thorough  was  their  motto,  efficiency 
their  ideal ;  if  morality  could  be  banished  from  the 
world,  they  might  be  taken  as  types  of  complete 
manhood.  The  man  who  saw  only  their  good  side 
might  well  be  carried  away  by  enthusiasm  for  their 
excellencies,  and  it  is  unquestionable  that  some- 
thing in  Petrarch  led  them  to  show  him  as  much 
as  possible  of  their  best  and  as  little  as  possible  of 
their  worst  side.  Of  their  base  intrigues  and  un- 
scrupulous treacheries  he  evidently  accepted  the 
version  which  they  themselves  gave  him  ;  and  if 
this  says  little  for  his  faculty  of  impartial  discern- 
ment, such  blindness  to  the  faults  of  a  friend  is  at 
worst  the  weakness  of  an  over-trustful  nature. 
However  incomplete  the  explanation,  to  those  who 
have  entered  into  Petrarch's  character  the  facts  are 
indisputable,  that  he  was  not  a  hypocrite,  and  that 
he  was  the  friend  of  Azzo. 

Their  friendship  began  at  Avignon,  but  was  the 
consequence  of  a  faction-fight  at  Parma :  the  family 
of  Correggio,  acting  as  henchmen  of  the  Lords  of 
Verona,  had  driven  the  Rossi  out  of  Parma  ;  the 
latter  came  to  plead  their  cause  before  the  Pope, 
and  were  opposed  by  Azzo  da  Correggio  and 
Gulielmo  da    Pastrengo,  an    accomplished    scholar 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP         67 

and  lawyer  of  Verona.  Azzo  and  Gulielmo  enpraged 
Petrarch  as  their  advocate  in  the  Papal  consistory, 
and  tlie  poet  won  his  case  in  this,  the  only  lawsuit 
in  which  there  is  any  record  of  his  having  appeared. 
His  success  got  him  the  temporary  goodwill  of 
Mastino  della  Scala,  at  that  time  Lord  of  Verona, 
and  the  enmity  of  Ugolino  de'  Rossi,  Archbishop  of 
Parma  ;  it  is  more  important  that  he  was  henceforth 
on  terms  of  warm  friendship  with  both  Azzo  and 
Gulielmo. 

To  the  following  year  belongs  an  incident  trivial 
in  itself,  but  interesting  as  showing  a  little  trait  in 
which  Petrarch  anticipated  the  modern  spirit.  Ac- 
companied by  his  brother  Gherardo  and  a  couple  of 
servants,  he  made  the  ascent  of  Mont  Ventoux, 
**a  steep  and  almost  inaccessible  mass  of  crags," 
and  one  of  the  highest  peaks  in  Provence.  He 
was  fascinated  by  the  wild  beauty  and  majestic 
solitude  of  peak  and  ravine,  which  were  foolishness 
to  the  classical  and  a  terror  to  the  mediaeval  world ; 
and  however  small  an  achievement  the  ascent  of 
Mont  Ventoux  may  appear  to  a  member  of  the 
Alpine  Club,  it  entitles  Petrarch  to  be  called  the 
first  of  the  climbers.  Among  the  ridges  of  the  hills 
the  brothers  found  an  old  shepherd,  who  tried  hard 
to  dissuade  them  from  the  ascent,  saying  that  "fifty 
years  ago  he  had  been  led  by  the  same  impetuous 
eagerness  of  youth  to  climb  the  peak,  but  had  got 
nothing  by  it  save  toil  and  regret  and  the  tearing 
of  his  flesh  and  clothes  by  the  rocks  and  brambles  ; 
and  never  either  before  or  since  had  any  one 
been  known  to  dare  the  like."     The  brothers,  how- 


68        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

ever,  persevered,  and  the  old  man,  finding  remon- 
strance of  no  avail,  showed  them  a  steep  track 
among-  the  rocks,  still  giving  them  many  warnings, 
which  he  kept  shouting  at  them  after  they  had  gone 
forward.  "  We  left  with  him,"  says  Petrarch  in  a 
letter  to  Fra  Dionigi,  "  so  much  of  our  dress  and 
other  things  as  was  likely  to  be  in  our  way,  and  so, 
girded  just  for  the  mere  ascent,  we  set  ourselves 
eagerly  to  our  climb.  But,  as  always  happens,  the 
strenuous  effort  was  very  soon  followed  by  fatigue  ; 
so  after  going  a  little  way  we  rested  on  one  of  the 
rocks. 

"  Thence  we  started  again,  but  at  a  slower  pace, 
and  I  especially  began  to  prosecute  mountain  climb- 
ing at  a  more  moderate  speed.  My  brother  pur- 
sued his  upward  path  by  the  shortest  way  over  the 
very  ridges  of  the  mountain  ;  but  I  was  less  hardy 
and  inclined  to  the  lower  paths,  and  when  he  called 
after  me  and  pointed  to  the  more  direct  way,  I 
answered  that  I  hoped  to  find  the  ascent  of  the 
other  side  easier,  and  was  not  afraid  of  taking  a 
longer  route  if  it  offered  a  gentler  slope.  This  I 
put  forward  as  an  excuse  for  my  laziness  ;  and  while 
the  others  had  already  arrived  on  high  ground,  I 
kept  wandering  along  the  hollows,  though  no  easier 
ascent  appeared  anywhere,  but  the  way  grew  longer 
and  my  vain  toil  heavier.  Presently  I  grew  heartily 
tired  and  sick  of  this  aimless  wandering,  and  deter- 
mined to  go  straight  up  the  heights.  There,  tired 
and  distressed,  I  came  up  with  my  brother,  who 
was  waiting  for  me  and  had  refreshed  himself  with 
a  long  rest,  and  for  a  little  time  we  went  on  to- 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP        69 

gether.  But  we  had  hardly  left  that  ridge  behind, 
when  behold !  I  forgot  my  former  circuit,  and  again 
fell  upon  the  lower  paths  ;  so  I  once  more  wandered 
along  the  hollows,  seeking  a  long  and  easy  way, 
but  finding  only  long  trouble.  I  tried,  forsooth,  to 
put  off  the  trouble  of  climbing ;  but  no  human 
device  can  do  away  with  the  nature  of  things,  and 
no  material  body  can  rise  higher  by  descending. 
Why  make  a  long  story  ?  Three  or  four  times  in 
a  few  hours  the  same  thing  occurred  to  me,  to  my 
own  vexation  and  my  brother's  amusement."  So 
he  sat  down  in  a  hollow  and  moralised  on  the  far- 
off  altitude  of  the  life  of  blessedness  and  the 
strenuous  climbing  needed  to  attain  to  it  ;  and 
"  these  thoughts  wonderfully  strengthened  both  body 
and  mind  in  me  to  undergo  the  rest  of  the  ascent. 
Would  that  I  might  accomplish  in  spirit  that  other 
journey,  for  which  I  sigh  day  and  night,  even  as, 
overcoming  at  lei^gth  all  difficulties,  I  accomplished 
this  of  to-day  with  my  bodily  feet !  .  .  .  There  is 
one  peak  higher  than  the  rest,  which  the  rustics 
call  'the  little  boy,'  for  what  reason  I  know  not, 
unless  it  be  from  sheer  contradiction,  as  I  suspect 
is  the  case  with  sundry  other  names  ;  for  it  looks 
truly  like  the  father  of  all  the  neighbouring  moun- 
tains. On  its  top  is  a  little  piece  of  level  ground, 
on  which  we  at  length  rested  our  weary  limbs.  .  .  . 
Here  I  stood  amazed  .  .  .  the  clouds  were  under 
our  feet  .  .  .  and  I  looked  in  the  direction  of  Italy, 
to  which  my  heart  is  most  inclined.  .  .  .  Then  a 
fresh  train  of  thought  occurred  to  me,  and  I  re- 
membered that  to-day  was  the  tenth  anniversary  of 


70        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

my  leaving  Bologna.  .  .  .  Oh  !  the  changes  of  those 
years !  .  .  ,  I  no  longer  love  what  I  used  to  love  ; 
nay,  that  is  not  true  ;  I  do  love  still,  but  with  more 
modesty  and  a  deeper  melancholy.  Yes,  I  still 
love,  but  unwillingly,  in  spite  of  myself,  in  sorrow 
and  tribulation  of  heart.  .  .  .  Then  I  began  to 
think  that  in  ten  years  more  I  might  at  least  hope 
to  be  fit  to  encounter  death  with  a  quiet  mind.  .  .  . 
And  passing  at  last  from  thoughts  of  myself  ...  I 
began  to  admire  the  view,  from  the  hills  of  the 
province  of  Lyons  on  the  right  to  the  bay  of 
Marseilles  on  the  left,  with  the  Rhone  flowing  close 
under  us.  While  looking  at  each  object  in  the 
landscape,  and  now  considering  the  earthly  scene 
and  again  passing  to  matters  of  a  higher  nature, 
it  occurred  to  me  to  look  at  the  Confessions  of 
Augustine  which  you  gave  me,  and  which  I  keep 
and  always  carry  about  with  me  in  memory  alike  of 
the  author  and  the  giver.  I  opened  the  little  volume 
of  tiny  compass  but  infinite  sweetness,  intending  to 
read  the  first  passage  that  might  offer  ;  for  what 
could  I  find  there  but  words  of  piety  and  devotion  ? 
It  chanced,  however,  that  I  hit  upon  the  tenth  book 
of  the  work.  My  brother  stood  listening,  waiting 
to  hear  a  sentence  from  Augustine  by  my  mouth  ; 
and  God  is  my  witness,  as  well  as  he  who  was 
standing  by,  that  my  eyes  first  lit  on  the  passage 
where  it  is  written  :  '  And  men  go  about  to  marvel 
at  the  heights  of  the  mountains,  at  the  huge  waves 
of  the  sea,  at  the  broad  estuaries  of  the  rivers,  at 
the  circuit  of  the  ocean,  and  at  the  revolutions  of 
the  stars,   and   forsake   their  own   souls.'     I    stood 


TRAVEL   AND    FRIENDSHIP         71 

amazed,  and  begging  my  brother,  who  was  eager 
to  hear  the  passage,  not  to  trouble  me,  I  shut  the 
book,  angry  with  myself  for  having  even  now  been 
marvelling  at  earthly  things,  when  I  ought  long 
since  to  have  learnt  even  from  the  philosophers  of 
the  Gentiles  that  there  is  nothing  marvellous  in 
comparison  with  the  soul,  and  when  it  is  great  all 
things  are  small  beside  it.  .  .  .  Then  I  felt  that  I 
had  seen  enough  of  the  mountain,  and  turned  my 
mind's  eye  back  upon  myself;  and  from  that  time 
no  one  heard  me  speak  till  we  reached  the  bottom. 
For  that  passage  had  brought  me  occupation 
enough ;  nor  could  I  believe  that  I  had  lighted  on 
it  by  mere  chance,  but  I  fancied  that  what  I  had 
read  there  was  a  special  message  to  my  own  heart. 
.  .  .  Amid  the  reflections  thus  engendered  ...  I 
returned  in  the  depth  of  night  and  by  moonlight  to 
the  rustic  inn,  whence  I  had  started  before  dawn, 
and  where  I  am  writing  you  this  hurried  letter 
while  the  servants  are  preparing  supper.  .  .  .  You 
see  then,  my  loving  father,  that  I  would  hide  nothing 
from  your  sight,  but  am  diligent  in  making  known 
to  you  not  only  the  general  course  of  my  life,  but 
the  separate  thoughts  of  my  heart.  Pray,  I  entreat 
you,  for  those  thoughts,  that  though  they  have  long 
been  wandering  and  unstable,  they  may  stand  firm 
at  the  last,  and  after  fruitless  tossing  on  many  a  sea, 
may  return  to  the  one  good  true  and  sure  founda- 
tion of  the  soul." 


CHAPTER    IV 

ROME   AND  VAUCLUSE 
1336-1340 

TEN  full  years  had  passed  since  Petrarch,  sum- 
moned back  from  Bologna  by  the  news  of 
his  father's  death,  had  quitted  Italy,  the  land  of  his 
devoted  attachment ;  and  it  does  not  appear  that 
he  had  yet  had  an  opportunity  of  revisiting  her. 
Three  years  earlier,  as  we  have  seen,  he  had  hoped 
to  go  to  Rome  with  Giacomo  Colonna,  but  the 
latter's  hurried  return  thither  after  the  affray  with 
the  Orsini  had  baulked  him  of  the  expected  visit. 
In  December  of  this  year  a  bantering  invitation  from 
Giacomo  gave  him  another  opportunity  which  he 
eagerly  seized.  "With  joy  and  laughter"  he  read 
in  this  letter  that  his  friend  esteemed  him  already, 
in  spite  of  his  youth,  the  cleverest  deceiver  in  the 
world.  "You  try  to  deceive  Heaven  itself,"  the 
Bishop  seems  to  have  said,  "by  feigning  devotion 
to  Saint  Augustine  ;  you  do  deceive  the  world  and 
get  yourself  immense  credit  by  feigning  a  passion 
for  '  Laura,'  when  the  crown  of  *  laurel '  is  the  real 
object  of  your  heart's  desire ;  and  you  very  nearly 
succeeded  in  deceiving  me  by  feigning  a  burning 
desire  to  come  and  visit  me  in  Rome."  To  this 
agreeable  jesting,  which  forms  the  chief  support  of 
the  allegorical  theory  of  Petrarch's  love,  the  poet 

72 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  73 

replied  by  protesting  the  genuineness  of  his  double 
devotion.  "Would  to  God,"  he  cries,  "that  your 
banter  were  true,  and  my  passion  a  feint  and  not 
a  madness !  .  .  .  But  you  know  well  that  it  is  so 
violent  as  to  have  affected  my  bodily  health  and 
complexion.  ...  I  can  only  hope  that  the  sore 
will  come  to  a  head  in  time,  and  that  I  may  find  the 
truth  of  Cicero's  saying  that  *  one  day  brings  a 
wound  and  another  day  healing.'  Against  this 
fiction,  as  you  call  it,  of  Laura,  perhaps  that  other 
fiction  of  Augustine  may  help  me,  for  by  much 
grave  reading  and  meditation  I  may  grow  old  before 
my  time.  .  .  .  But  as  to  yourself  and  Rome  .  .  . 
answer  me  seriously ;  put  out  of  sight  the  longing 
to  see  your  face,  which  I  have  borne  now  for  over 
three  years,  thinking  daily,  '  lo  I  to-morrow  he  will 
come,'  or  '  lo !  in  a  day  or  two  I  shall  start ' ;  take 
no  account  of  the  heavy  burden  of  my  troubles 
which  I  can  scarce  be  content  to  share  with  any  one 
but  you ;  grant  that  I  have  cooled  in  my  desire  to 
see  your  most  illustrious  father,  your  noble  brothers, 
and  your  honourable  sisters ;  still,  what  do  you 
think  I  would  not  give  to  see  the  walls  and  hills  of 
the  city,  and,  as  Virgil  says,  '  the  Tuscan  Tiber  and 
the  palaces  of  Rome '  ?  No  one  can  imagine  how 
I  long  to  look  upon  that  city,  deserted  and  the  mere 
image  of  old  Rome  though  it  be,  which  I  have 
never  yet  seen !  .  .  .  I  remember  how  Seneca 
exults  in  writing  to  Lucilius  from  the  very  villa  of 
Scipio  Africanus,  and  thinks  it  no  small  matter  to 
have  seen  the  place  where  that  great  man  spent  his 
exile,  and  where  he  laid  his  bones,  which  his  father- 


74       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

land  could  not  afterwards  obtain.  If  such  were  the 
feelings  of  a  Spaniard,  what,  think  you,  must  I  feel, 
who  am  Italian  born  ?  For  here  is  no  question  of 
the  villa  of  Liternum  or  the  tomb  of  Scipio,  but  of 
the  city  of  Rome,  where  Scipio  was  born  and 
nurtured,  where  he  won  equal  glory  as  victor  and  as 
accused,  and  where  not  only  he,  but  numberless 
other  men  lived,  whose  fame  shall  endure  for  ever." 

To  him  a  journey  to  Rome  was  indeed  a  pilgrim- 
age not  of  religion  only,  but  of  politics  and  culture 
also.  In  the  continuity  of  her  history  he  saw  an 
epitome  of  human  development ;  many  before  him 
had  been  moved  by  the  recollection  of  her  ancient 
glories ;  and  the  theory  of  her  claim  to  be  the  seat 
alike  of  Papacy  and  Empire  had  been  formulated 
by  Dante  in  a  treatise  which  may  be  called  the 
political  testament  of  the  Middle  Ages;  but  Petrarch 
is  the  first  to  read  her  history  as  a  whole  and  to 
regard  its  changing  periods  as  mere  phases  in  one 
deathless  career.  She  is  to  him  the  sacred  city 
not  merely  of  Christendom,  but  of  humanity. 

The  Cardinal's  permission  for  the  journey  was 
obtained,  and  Petrarch  immediately  started  for 
Marseilles,  where  he  took  ship  for  Civita  Vecchia. 
Off  Elba  he  encountered  a  storm,  but  arrived  safely 
in  port,  probably  about  the  middle  of  January. 
Here  he  found  it  impossible  to  go  on  to  Rome 
without  an  escort,  for  the  Orsini  had  collected  a 
strong  force  with  which  they  held  the  approaches 
to  the  city.  For  the  present  therefore  he  remained 
in  Capranica  (Mons  Caprarum),  a  hill-fortress  some 
thirty  miles  from   Rome,  where  he  was  welcomed 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  75 

by  Orso,  Count  of  Anguillara,  who  had  married 
Agnese  Colonna,  one  of  Stefano  the  Elder's  many 
daughters.  Thence  he  sent  a  courier  to  inform 
Giacomo  of  his  arrival,  and  also  wrote  a  full  account 
of  his  surroundinofs  to  Cardinal  Giovanni.  *'  I  have 
lighted  on  a  place  in  the  Roman  territory,"  he 
says,  "  which  would  suit  my  troubled  feelings  admir- 
ably if  my  mind  were  not  in  haste  to  be  elsewhere. 
Known  formerly  as  the  Mount  of  Goats  ...  it 
became  gradually  peopled  by  men,  who  built  a 
citadel  on  the  highest  mound,  round  which  have 
clustered  as  many  houses  as  the  narrow  limits  of 
the  hill  allowed.  Though  unknown  to  fame,  it  is 
surrounded  by  famous  places ;  on  one  side  is  Mount 
Soracte,  well  known  as  the  dwelling-place  of  Sil- 
vester, but  also  made  illustrious  before  Silvester's 
time  by  the  songs  of  the  poets ;  on  another  side  are 
the  lake  and  hill  of  Ciminus,  mentioned  by  Virgil ; 
and  there  is  Sutrium  only  two  miles  away,  the 
favoured  haunt  of  Ceres  and,  as  the  legend  runs,  a 
colony  of  Saturn.  Not  far  from  the  walls  they 
show  a  field  in  which  they  say  the  first  crop  of  corn 
in  Italy  was  sown  by  a  foreign  king  and  reaped 
with  the  sickle;  which  marvellous  benefit  so  softened 
the  rude  spirit  of  the  people,  that  this  foreigner  was 
by  their  favour  chosen  king  during  his  life  and 
worshipped  after  his  death,  for  after  reigning  to 
a  good  old  age,  he  was  represented  as  a  god  with  a 
sickle  in  his  hand.  The  air  here  seems  most 
healthy,  and  there  arc  beautiful  views  from  the 
surrounding  hills.  .  .  .  Peace  alone  is  wanting  to 
complete  the  prosperity  of  the  country.    .    .    .    For 


76       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

what  do  you  think  ?  The  shepherd  arms  himself 
for  his  woodland  watch,  from  fear  rather  of  robbers 
than  of  wolves  ;  the  ploughman  dons  a  breastplate 
and  takes  a  spear  to  do  the  office  of  a  goad  in  prod- 
ding the  flank  of  a  troublesome  ox ;  the  fowler 
throws  a  shield  over  his  nets  ;  the  fisherman  too 
hangs  his  hooks  with  their  beguiling  bait  from  the 
tempered  blade  of  a  sword  ;  and,  ridiculous  as  you 
will  think  it,  when  a  man  goes  to  draw  water 
from  the  well,  he  lowers  a  rusty  helmet  at  the  end 
of  his  dirty  rope.  In  a  word,  there  is  nothing  done 
here  without  arms.  All  nisfht  long-  the  watchmen 
howl  upon  the  walls  and  voices  call  to  arms ;  what 
cries  are  these  to  take  the  place  of  the  sounds  I 
have  been  wont  to  draw  from  the  melodious  strings ! 
Among  the  dwellers  in  these  lands  nothing  looks 
secure ;  there  is  not  a  word  of  peace  nor  a  feeling 
of  their  common  humanity,  only  war  and  hatred 
and  all  things  after  the  likeness  of  the  works  of 
devils.  In  this  place,  illustrious  father,  half  willingly 
and  half  unwillingly  I  have  now  spent  sixteen 
days ;  and  so  powerful  is  habit,  that  while  all  others 
rush  to  the  citadel  at  the  clang  of  arms  and  braying 
of  trumpets,  I  may  often  be  seen  wandering  over 
the  hills,  diligently  thinking  over  something  to  win 
me  the  favour  of  posterity.  All  are  astonished  to 
see  me  at  my  ease,  fearless  and  unarmed  ;  while  I 
am  astonished  to  see  them  all  fearful,  anxious,  and 
armed  :  such  differences  are  there  in  the  ways  of 
men!  If  haply  I  were  asked  whether  I  wish  to  go 
hence,  I  should  find  it  hard  to  answer  ;  'twere  well 
to  be  gone,  and  yet  'tis  pleasant  to  stay." 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  77 

Orso,  "the  Bear  who  is  gentler  than  any  lamb,"  and 
Agnes,  "one  of  those  women  who  are  best  praised 
by  silent  admiration,"  entertained  Petrarch  till 
Giacomo  could  join  him,  which  he  did  on  January 
26th,  riding  unmolested  from  Rome  with  his  eldest 
brother  Stefano  the  Younger  and  only  a  hundred 
horsemen,  although  five  hundred  of  the  Orsini  beset 
the  road.  The  party  probably  stayed  in  Capranica 
for  some  days.  Sonnet  XXXIV,  Perch'  to  t'  abbia 
guardato,  was  certainly  written  there,  and  others  of 
the  extant  poems  probably  owe  their  origin  to  those 
"wanderingfs  amongf  the  hills"  of  which  Petrarch 
speaks  to  the  Cardinal.  Presently  they  moved  on 
to  Rome,  where  he  was  received  as  one  of  them- 
selves by  the  whole  family,  especially  by  old 
Giovanni  di  San  Vito,  who  made  himself  his  con- 
stant companion  and  guide  through  the  city.  Even 
in  this  day  of  her  humiliation  the  glories  of  Rome 
paralysed  for  awhile  his  powers  of  composition. 
"  What  must  you  expect  me  to  write  from  the 
city,"  he  says,  "  after  the  long  letters  I  sent  you 
from  the  hills !  You  may  well  be  looking  for  an 
outpouring  of  eloquence  now  that  I  have  arrived  in 
Rome.  Well,  I  have  found  a  vast  theme,  which 
may  serve  perhaps  for  future  writing  ;  but  just  now 
I  dare  not  attempt  anything,  for  I  am  overwhelmed 
by  the  miracle  of  the  mighty  things  around  me, 
and  sink  under  the  weight  of  astonishment.  But 
one  thing  I  must  tell  you,  that  my  experience  is 
contrary  to  what  you  expected.  For  I  remember 
that  you  used  to  dissuade  me  from  coming  hither, 
chiefly  on  the  ground   that  my  enthusiasm  would 


78       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

cool  at  the  sight  of  the  city  laid  in  ruins,  and  ill- 
answering  to  its  fame  and  to  the  idea  which  I  had 
formed  of  it  from  books.  And  I  too,  though  burn- 
ing with  eagerness,  was  not  unwilling  to  wait,  fear- 
ing lest  the  image  which  I  had  formed  in  my  mind 
should  suffer  loss  by  actual  sight  and  by  the  pres- 
ence which  is  ever  the  foe  of  great  reputations. 
This  time,  however,  wonderful  to  say,  nothing  has 
been  lowered  and  everything  has  been  heightened 
by  it.  In  truth,  Rome  is  greater  and  her  remains 
are  greater  than  I  thought,  and  my  wonder  is  now 
not  that  she  conquered  the  world,  but  that  she  did 
not  conquer  it  sooner."  Some  years  later  he 
reminds  Giovanni  di  San  Vito  of  their  delightful 
excursions  together.  **  We  used  to  stroll  side  by 
side  in  the  mighty  city,"  he  writes,  "and  not  only 
in  it,  but  around  it  as  well,  and  every  step  brought 
some  suggestion  to  stir  the  mind  and  loose  the 
tongue."  The  two  were  often  accompanied  by 
Paolo  Annibaldi,  this  year  joint  Senator  of  Rome 
with  Stefano  the  Younger,  the  head  of  a  House 
allied  to  that  of  Colonna  by  ties  of  marriage 
and  friendship.  Paolo's  "extraordinary  worth  and 
humanity "  had  made  Petrarch  his  dear  friend : 
unlike  most  of  the  Roman  nobles,  he  cared  for  the 
artistic  and  historical  monuments  of  the  city  and 
sorrowed  over  her  ruin.  His  death  in  the  year 
1355,  while  still  in  the  flower  of  his  age,  was  a 
veritable  tragedy;  one  of  his  sons  was  killed  in  a 
faction-fight,  and  he  fell  dead  in  an  access  of  grief 
across  the  mutilated  body  of  his  boy. 

Strongly  as  Petrarch  had  always  felt  the  claims  of 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  79 

Rome  to  be  the  seat  of  Empire  and  Papacy,  he  was 
now  more  than  ever  disposed  to  assert  her  rights. 
Accordingly  he  wrote  once  more  to  Benedict  XII, 
resuming  the  subject  of  his  former  poem,  but  speak- 
ing now  in  his  own  person,  and  asserting  the 
superiority  of  Rome  over  all  other  countries. 
Benedict  had  now  settled  the  theological  question 
of  the  Beatific  Vision,  and  so,  Petrarch  suggested, 
had  time  to  take  measures  for  resuming  his  proper 
position  as  husband  of  Rome  and  father  of  all 
Italy.  But  probably  the  Pope  had  never  really 
intended  to  return  ;  certainly,  even  if  he  had  been 
sincere  in  expressing  his  wish  to  do  so,  the  intrigues 
of  the  French  party  among  the  Cardinals  were 
successful  in  detaining  him  at  Avignon,  and  so 
thoroughly  had  he  become  convinced  of  the  necessity 
of  remaining  there,  that  he  was  now  laying  the 
foundations  of  the  papal  palace  designed  to 
form  a  permanent  residence  for  himself  and  his 
successors. 

We  do  not  know  how  long  Petrarch  stayed  in 
Rome,  but  he  must  have  left  soon  after  Easter  if 
he  found  time  during  this  summer  for  the  extended 
travels  which  seem  clearly  indicated  in  a  poetical 
letter  addressed  to  Giacomo  Colonna.  These  travels 
can  hardly  be  assigned  to  any  other  date.  He 
returned  to  Avignon  on  August  i6th  ;  at  some 
time  in  the  interval  he  paid  a  visit  to  Lombez  to 
take  up  his  canonry  there,  and  in  the  course  of 
these  four  or  five  months  he  appears  also  to  have 
made  a  sea  trip  to  Morocco  and  to  have  visited  the 
English  Channel.     He  speaks  expressly  of  having 


8o       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

seen  "the  mountain  hardened  by  Medusa's  eye"  in 
the  country  of  the  Moors,  by  which  he  must  mean 
some  part  of  the  chain  of  Mount  Atlas;  and  thence, 
he  says,  he  went  northward,  and  came  "  where  the 
swollen  wave  of  the  British  sea  wears  away  with 
flow  and  ebb  of  tide  the  shores  that  stand  doubtful 
which  shall  receive  its  stroke."  The  chronology 
is  extremely  difficult,  and  some  critics  take  the  short 
way  of  treating  the  whole  letter  as  mere  rhetoric. 
But  the  travels  indicated  were  not  quite  impossible 
of  accomplishment  in  the  four  and  a  half  months 
available  for  them,  and  to  regard  inconvenient 
allusions  as  worthless  evidence  on  the  ground  that 
they  occur  in  a  poem  is  to  ignore  difficulties,  not  to 
solve  them. 

Avignon  on  his  return  appeared  to  him  more 
detestable  than  ever  ;  during  his  absence,  if  we  may 
trust  another  of  his  Latin  poetical  letters,  he  had 
enjoyed  intervals  of  respite  from  the  violence  of  his 
passion  for  Laura,  but  the  sight  of  her  rekindled 
that  passion  in  all  its  fury.  We  may  suppose  too 
that  his  hatred  of  Avignon  as  the  usurper  of  the 
rights  of  Rome  was  intensified  by  his  visit  to  the 
Eternal  City.  For  "on  my  return  thence,"  he  tells 
us,  "  I  could  not  endure  the  disgust  and  hatred  of 
things  in  general,  but  above  all  of  that  most  weari- 
some city,  naturally  implanted  in  my  mind,  and  so 
I  looked  about  for  some  better  retreat,  as  it  were  a 
harbour  of  refuge,  and  found  the  valley,  a  very 
small  one,  but  solitary  and  pleasant,  which  is  called 
The  Closed  Valley,  fifteen  miles  distant  from  Avig- 
non, where  rises  the  king  of  all  river  sources,  the 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  8i 

Sorgue.  Captivated  by  the  charm  of  the  place,  I 
transferred  thither  my  books  and  myself,"  He 
bought  a  small  house  at  Vaucluse  with  a  strip  of 
riverside  meadow  adjoining  it,  and  so  installed  him- 
self in  the  one  of  his  many  residences  which  is  best 
entitled  to  be  called  his  home,  and  has  been  most 
closely  associated  by  posterity  with  his  name  and 
fame. 

Many  reasons  make  the  date  of  his  settling  at 
Vaucluse  one  of  the  most  important  in  his  life. 
Hitherto  he  had  been  entirely  dependent  upon  his 
patrons ;  now,  though  still  looking  to  them  for  prefer- 
ment, he  had  a  home  of  his  own  in  which  he  could 
order  his  life  after  his  own  fashion.  Here  he  was 
free  from  the  agitation  which  the  sight  of  Laura 
never  failed  to  renew  in  his  spirit — he  intimates 
repeatedly  that  to  avoid  her  was  his  main  object 
in  going  to  Vaucluse — and  here  he  could  indulge 
that  love  of  scenery,  that  passion  for  nature  and 
solitude,  which  was  so  rare  among  the  men  of  his 
day,  and  contrasts  so  strongly  with  his  own  interest 
in  man  as  "the  proper  study  of  mankind."  Here 
too  he  had  abundant  leisure  for  literary  work ;  he 
was  free  from  the  bustle  and  distractions  of  town 
life,  and  he  made  such  good  use  of  his  time  that 
"  nearly  everything  which  he  ever  wrote  was  either 
finished,  begun,  or  planned  here."  But  though 
enjoying  the  leisure  and  quiet  of  almost  complete 
solitude,  he  was  not  cut  off  from  his  friends  or  from 
society.  Socrates  and  Laelius  came  often  to  see 
him  ;  the  Cardinal's  house  at  Avignon  was  open  to 
him  whenever  he  chose  to  go  there ;  and  visitors 

G 


82        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

from  every  part  of  Europe,  attracted  by  his  fame, 
soueht  him  out  in  his  retreat.  "While  I  was  livinor 
in  France  in  the  period  of  my  youth,"  he  says,  "  I 
was  surprised  to  see  sundry  noble  and  talented  men 
come  from  the  further  provinces  of  France,  as  well 
as  from  Italy,  with  no  other  design  than  that  of  see- 
ing me  and  holding  conversation  with  me ;  among 
whom  was  Peter  of  Poitiers,  of  honourable  memory, 
a  man  illustrious  alike  for  piety  and  for  learning. 
And  you  will  wonder  the  more  when  I  tell  you  that 
some  of  these  visitors  sent  me  magnificent  presents 
in  advance,  and  then  came  in  the  wake  of  their  gifts, 
as  though  they  would  smooth  the  way  and  open  the 
gates  by  their  liberality.  ...  By  word  and  deed 
they  proclaimed  that  they  came  to  Avignon  solely 
to  see  me,  so  that  if  I  was  not  in  the  city,  they 
would  take  no  heed  of  anything  there,  but  hastened 
on  to  the  source  of  the  Sorgue,  where  I  generally 
spent  the  summer."  Such  homage  was  very  grati- 
fying to  Petrarch  ;  the  love  of  fame  was  strong  in 
him  ;  he  shared  and  fostered  that  eager  pursuit  of 
personal  glory  which  marked  the  Italians  of  the 
Renaissance.  He  made  some  parade  of  despising 
the  opinions  of  "the  vulgar,"  but  in  his  heart  he 
liked  even  popular  applause,  and  he  could  not  fail 
to  be  elated  by  the  unstinted  homage  paid  to  his 
genius  by  men  qualified  to  appreciate  it.  It  is 
pleasant  to  add  that  when  embarrassed  by  the  diffi- 
culty of  disposing  of  these  admirers'  gifts  without 
offence  to  the  givers,  he  solved  the  problem  with 
characteristic  generosity  by  sharing  them  with  his 
friends. 


ROME    AND    VAUCLUSE  83 

At  Vauclusc  he  had  the  happiness  of  finding  a 
neighbour  who  soon  became  one  of  his  most 
intimate  friends.  Philip  de  Cabassoles  was  a 
member  of  a  noble  Provencal  family  connected  by 
long-standing  ties  of  marriage  and  friendship  with 
the  House  of  Anjou,  and  especially  with  the 
Neapolitan  branch  of  it.  King  Robert  of  Naples 
indeed,  who  as  Count  of  Provence  was  his  sove- 
reign, held  him  in  such  esteem  that  by  his  will  he 
appointed  him  a  member  of  the  Neapolitan  Council 
of  Regency  during  the  minority  of  his  grand- 
daughter Joanna.  Philip's  personal  qualities  justified 
the  unanimous  good  opinion  of  his  contemporaries. 
He  had  already  won  a  reputation  for  brilliant  intel- 
lectual attainments  ;  he  was  an  eager  student  and  an 
enthusiastic  patron  of  letters  ;  in  private  life  he  was 
the  most  loyal  of  friends  ;  and  when  the  time  came 
in  1343  for  him  to  take  up  the  ungrateful  task  of 
statesmanship  at  Naples,  he  struggled  gallantly 
though  ineffectually  to  uphold  public  order  and 
political  probity  amid  the  welter  of  factious  intrigue 
which  followed  the  Wise  King's  death.  Long  before 
the  canonical  age  he  had  been  appointed  by  John 
XXH  to  the  bishopric  of  Cavaillon,  "a  little  town," 
as  Petrarch  describes  it,  "about  two  leagues  from 
Vaucluse,  which  as  being  the  seat  of  a  bishopric  is 
dignified  with  the  name  of  city,  but  which  has  no 
quality  of  a  city  except  the  title  and  its  antiquity." 
Vaucluse  lay  within  the  diocese  of  Cavaillon,  and 
one  of  the  Bishop's  official  residences  was  a  castle 
perched  on  the  crags  which  overhang  the  valley. 
Here  Petrarch  paid  his  respects  to  Philip,  who  was 


84       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

a  year  his  junior  in  age,  and  the  two  men,  mutually 
attracted  by  each  other's  great  qualities,  contracted 
an  intimacy,  which  soon  ripened  into  one  of  the 
closest  and  most  valuable  of  Petrarch's  friendships. 
Philip  "loved  him  not  only  with  a  Bishop's  love,  as 
Ambrose  loved  Augustine,  but  with  that  of  a 
brother,"  and  his  affection  was  repaid  in  full.  The 
friends  spent  hours  in  each  other's  society,  entering 
each  other's  houses  unannounced,  and  using  each 
other's  books  as  a  common  possession.  To  Philip 
Petrarch  dedicated  the  De  Vita  Solitaria,  and  he 
was  one  of  the  very  few  friends  ever  permitted  to 
see  the  poet's  compositions  in  the  rough. 

Another  motive,  of  which  Petrarch  preserved  no 
record,  may  have  contributed  to  his  wish  for  partial 
retirement  from  Avignon.  In  this  year  (1337),  an 
illegitimate  son  was  born  to  him.  Of  his  fault 
much  has  been  said :  in  some  it  has  aroused  genuine 
indignation,  in  others  a  base  satisfaction  at  the 
lapses  of  a  devout  and  passionate  soul ;  of  his 
punishment  and  repentance  those  know  best  who 
have  studied  his  writings  most  closely  and  read  his 
character  most  accurately.  To  a  man  of  his  physical 
habit  temptation  came  with  its  fullest  force ;  is  it 
not  punishment  enough  that  to  a  man  of  his 
spiritual  temperament  penitence  was  an  agony  of 
the  soul }  We  do  not  know  who  was  Giovanni's 
mother ;  there  is  reason  to  suppose  that  she  was  a 
person  of  humble  origin,  and  that  she  was  also  the 
mother  of  his  daughter  Francesca,  born  to  him  six 
years  later ;  we  do  know  that  after  the  birth  of  the 
latter  child,  while  Petrarch  was  still  under  forty,  he 


ROME   AND   VAUCLUSE  85 

regained  control  of  his  passions,  and  that  his  subse- 
quent life  was  free  from  stain.  He  was  punished 
also,  as  we  shall  see  later,  by  the  conduct  of  the 
boy,  conduct  which  was  probably  aggravated  by 
the  father's  injudicious  handling  of  a  stubborn  and 
perverse  disposition,  and  by  mutual  misunderstand- 
ing due  to  the  inherent  difficulty  of  their  relations. 
Petrarch's  very  conscientiousness  made  the  mis- 
chief worse ;  he  felt  himself  deeply  responsible  for 
Giovanni's  character  and  education  ;  though  he  did 
not  call  the  boy  by  the  name  of  son,  he  procured  him 
letters  of  legitimacy,  and  never  hesitated  to  acknow- 
ledge his  own  fault,  if  the  acknowledgment  was 
necessary  for  Giovanni's  preferment.  He  spent  in- 
finite pains,  too,  on  training  the  boy  in  liberal  learning; 
in  return  he  unhappily  demanded  a  pliancy  foreign  to 
Giovanni's  nature,  and  any  father  who  would  learn 
how  to  deter  a  son  from  the  path  in  which  he 
wishes  him  to  walk  has  only  to  study  the  history  of 
Petrarch  and  Giovanni.  It  is  the  melancholy  story 
of  two  persons  connected  by  no  tie  except  that 
of  natural  kinship,  which,  if  it  does  not  inspire 
community  of  tastes  and  mutual  affection,  will  surely 
aofSfravate  and  embitter  the  disao^reement  of  their 
tempers.  Doubtless  the  boy  was  most  to  blame  ; 
he  was  constitutionally  idle,  perverse,  and  sullen. 
But  it  is  evident  enough  that  his  faults  were 
enhanced  by  the  mismanagement  of  his  father.  To 
those  whose  character  commanded  his  sympathy 
Petrarch  was  the  best  of  friends  and  the  most 
genial  of  instructors,  but  he  had  neither  patience 
nor  tact   enougrh  to  overcome   the   difficulties  of  a 


86       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

natural  antipathy.  Above  all  things,  idleness  and 
sullenness  were  hateful  to  him  ;  so  when  Giovanni 
was  idle,  he  lectured  him  and  teased  him  with 
instances  of  exemplary  diligence,  or  tried  to  rouse 
him  out  of  the  sulks  by  sermonising,  or,  worst  of 
all,  by  sarcasm  and  ridicule.  Conscientiously  he 
tried  to  do  his  duty ;  but  the  more  he  tried  the 
worse  he  blundered,  and  it  is  hardly  surprising  that 
the  boy  showed  his  worst  side  to  his  father,  while 
some  of  Petrarch's  friends  discerned  in  him  through 
all  his  faults  a  promise  of  better  things. 

On  April  17th,  1338,  during  a  visit  to  Avignon, 
he  had  the  inestimable  joy  of  recovering  the  beauti- 
ful MS.  of  Viroil  which  had  been  one  of  the  treas- 
ures  of  his  father's  library,  and  had  been  stolen 
from  him  in  1326.  We  do  not  know  the  circum- 
stances in  which  he  regained  possession  of  it,  further 
than  that  his  own  note  on  the  fly-leaf  speaks  of  its 
**  restitution,"  which  seems  to  point  to  a  voluntary 
act  on  the  part  of  its  unlawful  possessor.  Precious 
as  is  the  codex  itself,  this  fly-leaf  is  more  precious 
still,  for  on  it  in  Petrarch's  beautiful  handwriting 
(a  kind  of  delicate  black-letter,  which  cannot  have 
been  taken  by  Aldus,  as  tradition  asserts,  for  the 
model  of  his  cursive  type)  are  recorded  the  dates  of 
his  first  meeting  with  Laura  and  of  her  death, 
together  with  the  deaths  of  his  son  Giovanni,  of 
Socrates,  and  of  many  other  friends.  Surely  a  more 
pathetic  document  was  never  penned  in  the  whole 
course  of  literary  history.  From  the  date  of  its 
recovery  this  cherished  volume  accompanied  its 
owner  everywhere ;    and   on   its   fly-leaf,    the  page 


ROME   AND   VAUCLUSE  87 

which  his  eye  would  see  oftener  than  any  other,  he 
"set  down  a  record  of  the  cruel  events,  not  without 
a  bitter  sweetness  in  the  remembrance  of  them." 
Some  time  after  Petrarch's  death  the  book  became 
the  property  of  Gian-Galeazzo  Visconti,  and  was 
kept  at  Pavia  till  the  submission  of  that  city  to  the 
French  King's  troops  in  1499,  when  Antonio  Pirro 
saved  it  from  the  plunderers  ;  from  him  it  passed 
through  several  hands  till  it  was  bought  by  Cardinal 
Borromeo,  who  presented  it  to  the  Ambrosian 
Library  at  Milan.  Napoleon  stole  it,  but  in  181 5 
it  was  restored  to  Milan,  and  is  still  one  of  the  chief 
treasures  of  the  library. 

About  this  time  Petrarch  came  in  contact  with 
Humbert  II,  the  last  Dauphin  of  Vienne.  The  im- 
pending outbreak  of  war  between  France  and 
England  placed  this  Prince  in  a  position  of  em- 
barrassment, for  he  owed  homage  both  to  the 
Emperor  and  to  the  King  of  France.  The  former 
summoned  him  to  help  his  ally.  King  Edward  III, 
the  latter  to  join  the  French  force  against  the  Eng- 
lish. The  Dauphin's  chief  anxiety  seems  to  have 
been  to  keep  out  of  the  fighting ;  an  old  chronicler 
describes  him  as  having  the  air  and  manners  of  a 
woman  ;  and  his  double  allegiance  furnished  a  not 
unwelcome  pretext.  Instead  of  joining  either  party, 
he  established  himself  at  Avignon,  where  the  Pope 
had  assigned  him  a  house,  and  employed  himself 
in  prosecuting  a  lawsuit  with  the  Archbishop  of 
Vienne.  Cardinal  Colonna  gfot  Petrarch  to  write 
him  a  letter  exhorting  him  to  take  up  arms  for 
Philip,  but  the  peaceful  disposition  of  the  Dauphin 


88       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

was  proof  against  the  poet's  eloquence.  He  stayed 
at  Pont  du  Sorgue  and  prosecuted  his  lawsuit.  It 
was  probably  with  him  that  Petrarch  and  his  brother 
Gherardo  made  an  expedition  to  the  Ste.  Beaume, 
or  cave  of  St.  Mary  Magdalene,  near  Marseilles. 
A  man  "  whose  high  position  far  transcended  his 
prudence,"  Petrarch  tells  us,  a  great  personage  whose 
society  was  not  at  all  pleasing  to  him,  frequently 
pressed  him  to  accompany  him  on  this  expedition. 
Petrarch  as  constantly  refused  till  Cardinal  Colonna 
backed  the  great  man's  request ;  the  poet  then 
yielded,  and  some  devotional  Latin  verses  of 
mediocre  quality  were  the  fruit  of  his  visit  to  this 
sacred  but  fearsome  cavern.  For  his  brother 
Gherardo  the  journey  proved  more  notable :  he 
took  advantage  of  it  to  visit  for  the  first  time  the 

o 

Carthusian  monastery  of  Montrieu,  in  which  some 
years  later  he  was  to  take  the  vows. 

About  this  time  also  Petrarch  had  the  happiness 
of  renewing  his  friendship  with  Azzo  da  Correggio 
and  Gulielmo  da  Pastrengo.  Their  mission  to 
Avignon  was  the  result  of  one  of  those  family  feuds 
ending  in  murder  so  frequent  in  the  history  of  the 
Italian  despots.  Mastino  della  Scala  had  taken 
possession  of  Lucca  in  defiance  of  the  treaty  rights 
of  the  Florentines;  his  cousin  Bartolommeo,  Bishop 
of  Verona,  was  accused,  truly  or  falsely,  of  a  con- 
spiracy to  murder  him  and  hand  over  Lucca  to  the 
allied  troops  of  Florence  and  Venice.  Azzo  da 
Correggio  was  the  accuser,  and  on  August  6th, 
1338,  Mastino,  probably  accompanied  by  Azzo,  met 
the    Bishop    on    the    steps    of    the    cathedral    and 


THE   TOMBS   OF   THE   SCAI.IC.ERI,    VERONA 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  89 

stabbed  him  to  death.  Then  he  sent  off  Azzo  in 
hot  haste  as  his  ambassador  to  the  Pope  to  obtain 
absolution,  and  associated  GuHelmo  and  another 
lawyer  with  him  as  his  advocates. 

They  reached  Avignon  in  September,  and  Pet- 
rarch, hearing  of  their  arrival,  came  over  from 
Vaucluse  to  see  them.  But  hardly  had  he  reached 
Avignon  when  a  frenzy  of  emotion  overmastered 
him  ;  the  sight  of  the  city  brought  back  the  wild 
tumult  of  his  passions ;  he  could  not  stay,  but  fled 
back  to  Vaucluse,  and  a  day  or  two  afterwards 
wrote  to  tell  Gulielmo  the  cause  of  his  absence. 
The  violent  mood  soon  passed,  no  doubt,  and  he 
renewed  the  habit  of  which  he  speaks  in  this  letter, 
of  "revisiting  this  ill-omened  city  and  returning 
voluntarily  into  the  snare  to  which  no  hook  of 
necessity  drew  him."  The  ambassadors  stayed  a 
whole  year  at  Avignon,  and  the  friends  met  fre- 
quently both  there  and  at  Vaucluse.  In  September, 
1339,  the  Pope  formally  absolved  Mastino,  and  the 
envoys  returned  to  Italy. 

The  year  1339  is  notable  too  for  Petrarch's  first 
meeting  with  the  Abbot  Barlaam,  under  whom  three 
years  later  he  made  an  ineffectual  attempt  at  learning 
Greek.  Barlaam  was  a  native  of  Calabria,  but  had 
lived  most  of  his  life  in  Salonika  and  Constanti- 
nople, where  he  was  Abbot  of  the  monastery  of  St. 
Gregory.  He  is  described  by  Boccaccio  as  a  man 
of  diminutive  stature  but  huge  learning  ;  as  a  theo- 
logical disputant  he  had  made  bitter  enemies  at  Con- 
stantinople, but  just  now  he  was  in  high  favour  with 
the  Court,  and  the  Emperor  Andronicus  had  sent  him 


90       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

to  Avionon  on  one  of  those  futile  missions  which 
had  for  pretext  the  reunion  of  the  Churches,  and  for 
real  object  an  inquiry  whether  the  West  could  be 
cajoled  into  helping  the  East  with  men  or  money. 

Petrarch  has  left  some  delicrhtful  accounts  of  his 
life  at  Vaucluse,  but  most  of  these  refer  to  the 
second  and  third  periods  of  his  sojourn  there,  and 
will  be  noticed  later.  There  is  evidence  enough, 
however,  to  show  that  this  first  period  too  was  one 
of  intense  literary  activity,  pursued  in  a  life  of  rustic 
frugality.  "  Long  would  be  the  story,"  he  writes, 
"  if  I  went  on  to  tell  what  I  did  there  through  many 
and  many  a  year.  This  is  the  sum  of  it,  that  almost 
every  one  of  the  poor  works  which  have  come  from 
my  pen  was  either  completed,  begun,  or  planned 
there.  .  .  .  The  very  aspect  of  the  place  suggested 
to  me  that  I  should  attempt  my  bucolic  poetry,  a 
woodland  work,  and  the  two  books  upon  the  life  of 
solitude  .  .  .  and  as  I  wandered  among  those  hills 
on  a  certain  Friday  in  Holy  Week  I  hit  upon  the 
thought,  which  proved  a  fruitful  one,  of  writing  a 
poem  in  heroic  verse  about  the  great  Scipio  Afri- 
canus  the  Elder,  whose  name,  I  know  not  why,  had 
been  dear  to  me  from  my  boyhood."  In  addition 
to  all  these  compositions,  there  is  good  reason  to 
think  that  his  earlier  years  at  Vaucluse  saw  at  least 
the  beginning  of  his  greatest  prose  work,  the  Lives 
of  Illustrious  Men ;  and  if  he  wanted  a  change  from 
original  composition,  there  were  always  his  classical 
manuscripts  lying  ready  to  his  hand  for  the  careful 
annotation  which  reveals  to  us  the  wide  range  and 
the  thoroughness  of  his  reading. 


ROME    AND   VAUCLUSE  91 

As  evidence  of  his  manner  of  life,  take  the  loUow- 
inor  delio^htful  note  in  which  he  invites  Cardinal 
Colonna  to  sup  with  him  :  "  You  will  come  a  long- 
hoped-for  guest  to  supper,  and  will  remember  that 
we  have  no  market  of  dainties  here.  A  poet's 
banquet  awaits  you,  and  that  not  of  Juvenal's  or 
Flaccus'  kind,  but  the  pastoral  sort  that  Virgil 
describes  :  '  mellow  apples,  soft  chestnuts,  and  rich 
store  of  milky  curd.'  The  rest  is  harder  fare : 
a  coarse,  stiff  loaf,  a  chance  hare,  or  a  migratory 
crane — and  that  very  seldom  ;  or  perhaps  you  will 
find  the  chine  of  a  strong-flavoured  boar.  Why 
make  a  long  story  ?  You  know  the  roughness  of 
both  place  and  fare,  and  so  I  bid  you  come  with 
shoes  not  only  on  your  feet,  but,  as  the  parasite  in 
Plautus  wittily  says,  on  your  teeth  too." 


p 


CHAPTER   V 

THE   CROWN   OF  SONG 

1340-1341 

ETRARCH  had  not  yet  reached  his  thirty- 
seventh  birthday  when  he  won  the  object  of 
his  highest  ambition — the  Crown  of  Sonir.  The 
bestowal  of  this  laurel  wreath  was  an  ancient  custom 
last  observed  in  Rome  in  the  case  of  the  poet  Statins, 
who  received  the  bays  from  Domitian  as  the  prize 
of  a  contest  of  "music  and  gymnastic."  Though 
twelve  centuries  had  elapsed  since  that  event,  the 
memory  of  the  custom  still  survived  :  Dante  had 
coveted  the  crown  in  vain,  and  Petrarch  from  his 
earliest  manhood  made  no  secret  of  his  eager  desire 
to  win  it.  He  was  attracted  by  its  historical  con- 
nection with  old  Rome,  by  the  picturesque  nature 
of  the  ceremony,  above  all  by  the  public  recognition 
of  the  recipient's  mastery  in  the  art  of  poetry.  He 
was  no  dilettante  scribbler,  no  amateur  of  letters 
desirous  of  the  palm  without  the  dust ;  he  was 
willing,  nay  eager,  to  live  laborious  days,  and  to 
spend  himself  and  his  substance  in  the  pursuit  of 
learning.  But  he  cared  dearly  too  for  the  reward 
so  hardly  earned ;  he  longed  for  the  applause  of  men 
qualified  to  appreciate  him  ;  he  was  athirst  for  fame. 
Even  his  thirst  must  have  been  assuaged  when  on 

92 


THE    CROWN    OF   SONG  93 

one  and  the  same  clay,  September  ist,  1340,  he 
received  letters  from  Rome  and  from  Paris  offerintj 
him  the  object  of  his  desire.  He  wrote  that  very 
eveninor  to  Cardinal  Colonna  askinij  his  advice  as 
to  which  invitation  he  should  accept.  "  I  am  at  the 
parting  of  two  roads,"  he  said  to  the  Cardinal, 
"and  I  stand  hesitating  and  knowing  not  which  I 
had  better  take  ;  it  is  a  short  story,  but  wonderful 
enough.  To-day  about  nine  o'clock  I  received  a 
letter  from  the  Senate  summoning  me  in  pressing 
terms  and  with  much  persuasion  to  Rome  to  receive 
the  crown  of  song.  To-day  also,  about  four  o'clock, 
a  message  reached  me  with  a  letter  on  the  same 
subject  from  the  illustrious  Robert,  Chancellor  of 
the  University  of  Paris,  my  fellow-citizen,  and  a 
firm  friend  to  me  and  my  fortunes.  He  urges  me 
with  carefully  chosen  reasons  to  go  to  Paris.  Who 
could  ever  have  suspected,  I  ask  you,  that  such  a 
thing  would  happen  among  these  rocks  and  hills? 
In  fact,  the  thing  is  so  incredible  that  I  send  you 
both  the  letters  with  the  seals  uninjured.  The  one 
summons  came  in  the  morning,  the  other  in  the 
evening ;  and  you  will  see  how  weighty  are  the 
arguments  which  appeal  to  me  on  either  side.  Now 
since  joy  suits  ill  with  deliberation,  I  own  that  I  am 
as  much  perplexed  in  mind  as  joyful  at  my  good 
fortune.  On  one  side  is  the  attraction  of  novelty, 
on  the  other  veneration  for  antiquity  ;  on  the  one 
my  friend,  on  the  other  my  country.  One  thing 
indeed  weighs  heavily  in  the  latter  scale,  that  the 
King  of  Sicily  is  in  Italy,  whom  of  all  men  I  can 
most  readily  accept  as  judge  of  my  ability.     You 


94       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

see  now  all  the  waves  that  toss  my  thoughts  ;  you, 
who  have  not  scorned  to  put  your  hand  to  their 
helm,  will  direct  by  your  counsel  the  stormy  passage 
of  my  mind." 

Petrarch  would  hardly  have  asked  the  Cardinal's 
advice  if  he  had  not  been  sure  of  the  answer.  To 
balance  the  claims  of  Rome  and  Paris  was  a  pretty 
literary  exercise  ;  but  in  his  judgment  Paris  kicked 
the  beam.  Rome  was  for  him  the  world's  capital, 
whose  offer  of  the  crown  proclaimed  him  the 
world's  poet ;  in  Rome  he  meant  to  be  crowned, 
and  to  Rome  Cardinal  Colonna  advised  him  to  go. 

On  the  way  he  would  visit  Naples.  Robert  the 
Wise,  titular  King  of  Jerusalem  and  the  Two 
Sicilies,  had  long  been  one  of  his  heroes.  He 
wrote  of  him  as  "that  consummate  king  and  philo- 
sopher, equally  illustrious  in  letters  and  in  dominion, 
unique  among  the  kings  of  our  day  as  a  friend  of 
knowledge  and  of  virtue."  And  Robert  deserved 
high  praise.  He  had  his  faults,  though  Petrarch 
did  not  see  them.  He  reminds  us  a  little  of  our 
British  Solomon,  who  stands  at  the  close  of  the 
Renaissance  as  Robert  stands  at  its  opening,  a  king 
eager  to  be  reputed  wise,  whose  statesmanship  was 
too  often  mere  statecraft,  and  whose  learning  bore 
the  taint  of  pedantry.  But  the  comparison  with 
James  is  grievously  unjust  to  Robert ;  his  faults,  if 
like  in  kind,  were  less  in  degree,  and  he  had  what 
the  Stuart  lacked — the  saving  grace  of  magnanimity. 
There  was  nothing  petty  about  him.  His  title 
"King  of  Jerusalem"  was  a  mere  reminiscence  of 
an  episode  in  history;  of  the  Two  Sicilies  the  island 


THE   MONUMENT  OF    KINC   ROBERT   OF    NAPLES 


THE    CROWN    OF   SONG  95 

kingdom  had  passed  under  the  sway  of  the 
Aragonese ;  but  the  reahu  of  Naples  throve  under 
his  rule,  and  carried  weight  in  European  politics 
out  of  all  proportion  to  its  natural  resources.  As 
a  skilful  diplomatist  and  a  prudent  ruler  Robert 
earned  his  surname  of  "the  Wise." 

He  earned  it  still  better  as  a  friend  of  learning; 
the  greatest  of  his  services  to  his  age  and  country- 
lay  in  his  treatment  of  artists  and  men  of  letters. 
The  brilliant  and  versatile  Emperor  Frederick  H 
had  lived  with  poets  as  comrades,  not  as  depen- 
dents ;  Robert  followed  this  forgotten  example,  and 
made  it  the  fashion.  He  received  Petrarch  not  as 
a  client,  but  as  a  friend ;  under  colour  of  "examin- 
ing" him,  he  organised  a  public  display  of  the 
poet's  prowess,  and  lavished  on  him  every  possible 
token  of  friendship  and  esteem.  By  this  reception 
of  Petrarch,  Robert  enthroned  intellect  in  the  face 
of  Europe. 

Petrarch's  journey  from  Provence,  his  stay  in 
Naples,  and  his  coronation  in  Rome  occupied  nearly 
two  months ;  there  is  some  conflict  of  evidence  as 
to  the  exact  dates  of  his  movements,  and  even  as  to 
the  day  of  the  coronation,  but  the  following  narra- 
tive gives  what  seems  to  be  the  most  probable 
account.  Accompanied  by  Azzo  da  Correggio,  he 
left  Avignon  on  February  i6th,  1341,  and  took 
ship  at  Marseilles.  The  friends  reached  Naples 
early  in  March,  and  remained  there  as  the  guests  of 
King  Robert  till  the  beginning  of  April.  Day  after 
day  Petrarch  and  the  King  had  long  conferences, 
at  which  they  discussed  poetry,  history,  and  philo- 


96       PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

sophy ;  personal  intercourse  heightened  their  mutual 
admiration,  and  the  poet's  enthusiasm  knew  no 
bounds  when  Robert  declared  to  him  that  he  valued 
learning  and  letters  above  the  crown  of  Naples 
itself.  Then  came  the  examination  alluded  to 
above,  surely  the  longest  viva  voce  on  record,  when 
Robert  assembled  his  whole  Court,  and  for  two 
days  and  a  half  propounded  question  after  question 
in  every  known  branch  of  learning.  All  these  the 
poet  seems  to  have  answered  to  the  satisfaction  of 
his  audience,  and  on  the  third  day  Robert  solemnly 
pronounced  him  worthy  of  the  laurel  crown,  and 
offered  to  confer  it  on  him  with  his  own  hand  in 
Naples.  But  Petrarch  was  loyal  to  Rome ;  only  in 
the  Capitol  would  he  receive  the  supreme  distinc- 
tion ;  and  Robert  respected  a  preference  of  which  he 
fully  understood  the  motive.  It  was  only  his  age, 
he  declared,  and  not  his  royal  rank,  that  prevented 
him  from  going  himself  to  Rome  for  the  occasion. 
Feeling  himself  unequal  to  the  journey,  he  appointed 
the  accomplished  knight  Giovanni  Barili,  a  favourite 
officer  of  his  household,  to  act  as  his  deputy,  wrote 
letters  testifying  to  Petrarch's  worthiness  to  receive 
the  laurel,  and  gave  him  his  own  purple  robe  to 
wear  at  the  ceremony. 

With  Barili  Petrarch  formed  a  lasting  friendship, 
and  to  this  Neapolitan  visit  he  owed  also  a  still 
closer  intimacy  with  Marco  Barbato,  the  Chancellor 
of  the  kingdom,  a  native  of  Ovid's  birthplace 
Sulmo,  himself  a  man  of  letters  and  a  poet,  "ex- 
cellent in  talent,  and  still  more  excellent  in  life." 
The  warmth  of  Petrarch's   friendship  for   Barbato 


THE   CROWN   OF   SONG  97 

is  testified  by  a  number  of  letters  couched  in  terms 
of  confidence  and  affection,  and  by  the  dedication 
to  him  of  the  Latin  poetical  letters.  Yet  they 
met  only  twice  in  twenty -two  years ;  and  from 
1343  to  Barbato's  death  in  1363  their  intercourse 
was  carried  on  entirely  by  correspondence.  Their 
friendship  furnishes  an  interesting  example  of  a 
sympathy  which  twenty  years  of  absence  could  not 
weaken. 

On  April  2nd  Barili  and  his  attendants  left 
Naples,  and  either  then  or  two  days  later  Petrarch 
and  Azzo  set  out  in  turn  by  a  different  route  for 
Rome.  They  arrived  safely  on  Good  Friday,  the 
6th,  and  were  received  by  Orso  and  the  members 
of  the  Colonna  family  present  in  the  city ;  but  when 
they  inquired  for  Barili,  no  news  of  him  could  be 
heard.  Hastily  they  sent  out  a  courier  to  scour 
the  country  ;  but  Easter  Eve  passed  without  tidings 
of  the  King's  envoy,  who  had  in  fact  fallen  into  the 
hands  of  banditti  near  Anagni,  and  was  detained 
their  prisoner  for  several  days.  The  coronation 
could  not  be  deferred  beyond  Easter  Sunday,  for 
on  the  close  of  that  day  Orso's  senatorship  came  to 
an  end,  and  it  was  essential  that  Petrarch  should 
be  crowned  while  the  Chief  Magistracy  was  still 
held  by  one  of  his  friends.  Early  on  Easter  morn- 
ing, therefore,  April  8th,  trumpeters  summoned  the 
populace  to  the  Capitol.  The  novelty  of  the 
spectacle,  resumed  after  an  interval  of  centuries, 
the  splendour  and  pomp  of  the  pageant,  probably 
also  the  newly  awakened  zeal  for  art  and  letters, 
drew  a  vast  crowd  of  onlookers,  whose  enthusiastic 


98        PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

applause  drowned,  at  least  for  the  moment,  the 
voices  of  envy  and  detraction.  Here,  in  Rome, 
they  were  met  to  do  honour  to  the  poet  and  scholar 
whose  enthusiasm  for  their  city  was  to  be  the  key- 
note of  the  new  learning,  who  was  to  revive  and 
popularise  the  memories  of  her  glorious  past,  and  to 
claim  anew  for  her,  in  these  days  of  her  desertion  by 
Pope  and  Emperor,  the  indefeasible  right  to  rule 
the  world. 

Of  the  ceremony  itself  we  have  few  details ;  but 
from  what  we  know  we  can  infer  that  it  was  worthy 
of  the  occasion.  Twelve  boys,  richly  dressed  in 
scarlet,  led  the  way ;  they  were  all  fifteen  years  of 
age,  and  were  chosen  from  twelve  of  the  noblest 
Roman  families.  After  them,  clad  in  green  and 
crowned  with  flowers,  came  six  of  the  principal 
nobles  of  the  city,  Petrarch's  old  friend  Paolo  Anni- 
baldi  being  one  of  them  ;  and  in  the  midst  of  this 
distinguished  escort  walked  Petrarch  himself,  wear- 
ing the  purple  robe  of  the  King  of  Naples.  After 
him  came  the  Senator  escorted  by  the  chief  func- 
tionaries of  the  city,  and  we  may  be  sure  that  a 
procession  in  which  the  leading  men  of  Rome  and 
their  sons  took  part  was  not  lacking  in  either  the 
number  of  its  attendants  or  the  brilliance  of  its 
pageantry.  When  they  reached  the  top  of  the 
Capitoline  Hill  a  herald  summoned  Petrarch  to 
speak.  He  saluted  the  people,  and,  taking  a  verse 
of  Virgil  for  his  text,  gave  an  elaborate  discourse 
on  the  difficulties,  delights,  and  rewards  of  poetry, 
concluding  with  a  prayer  that  the  Senator,  as  repre- 
sentative of  the  Roman  people,  would  be  pleased  to 


THE   CROWN    OF   SONG  99 

bestow  on  him  the  crown  of  which  the  King  of 
"  Sicily  "  had  judged  him  worthy.  Then  he  knelt 
down  before  Orso,  who  placed  the  laurel  crown  on 
his  head  and  declared  aloud  that  he  gave  it  him 
as  the  reward  of  distinguished  merit.  After  this 
Petrarch  recited  a  sonnet,  which  has  not  been  pre- 
served, in  remembrance  of  the  heroes  of  old  Rome, 
and  the  veteran  Stefano  Colonna  spoke  a  glowing 
eulogy  of  the  newly  crowned  poet. 

This  ended  the  ceremony  on  the  Capitol.  It 
seems  to  have  been  purely  civic  in  its  character,  for 
no  hint  is  given  of  any  ecclesiastical  rite  or  function 
in  connection  with  it.  But  Petrarch  was  of  all  men 
least  likely  to  forget  the  claims  of  religion  ;  very 
great  as  might  be  his  elation  at  the  recognition  of 
his  genius  and  his  work,  he  remembered  in  the  hour 
of  his  triumph  to  give  God  the  glory.  The  pro- 
cession reformed  and  escorted  him  to  St.  Peter's, 
where  he  publicly  gave  thanks  for  the  honour  con- 
ferred on  him,  and  left  his  laurel  crown  to  hang 
among  the  votive  offerings  of  the  cathedral.  The 
day  ended  with  a  banquet  in  his  honour,  and  the 
presentation  to  him  by  Orso  of  a  diploma  testifying 
to  his  excellence  in  the  arts  of  poetry  and  history, 
authorising  him  to  teach  and  dispute  in  public  and 
to  publish  books  at  his  pleasure,  and  conferring 
upon  him  the  citizenship  of  Rome  in  recognition  of 
his  loyal  devotion  to  her  interests. 

Thus  ended  a  day  notable  not  only  in  the  life  of 
its  hero,  but  in  the  history  of  letters.  It  is  prob- 
ably true  that  Petrarch  owed  this  conspicuous 
honour  as  much  to  the  partiality  of  his  friends  as  to 


loo     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

the  general  recognition  of  his  services.  The  best  of 
his  work  was  still  to  be  done ;  he  himself  in  old 
age,  looking  back  on  this  most  brilliant  day  of  his 
life,  admitted  with  evident  sincerity  that  the  leaves 
of  his  laurel  crown  were  immature,  and  that  a  not 
unnatural  result  of  its  reception  was  to  bring  upon 
him  much  envy  and  ill-will.  It  was  by  his  Italian 
poetry  that  he  was  chiefly  known  as  yet,  and  we 
have  seen  that  his  Italian  poetry,  exquisite  and  in 
some  respects  unique  as  are  its  qualities,  had  little 
effect  in  the  really  important  work  of  his  life,  the 
revival  of  learning.  In  connection  with  that  work, 
it  is  true  that  he  had  already  gained  a  European 
reputation  as  an  earnest  and  indefatigable  student, 
bent  on  accumulating  knowledge,  and  eager  to 
diffuse  it ;  but  he  had  as  yet  published  little  or 
nothing  to  justify  in  the  face  of  the  world  the  high 
esteem  of  his  admirers.  Still,  when  every  allowance 
has  been  made  for  personal  influence,  and  every 
possible  point  conceded  to  those  who  were  already 
carping  at  the  honour  conferred  on  him,  the  fact 
remains  that  his  coronation  marks  the  awakening  of 
general  interest  in  learning,  the  end  of  an  age  in 
which  letters  were  the  exclusive  possession  of  a 
few,  and  the  advent  of  a  time  when  even  those  who 
did  not  themselves  possess  scholarship  would  owe 
the  tone  of  their  thought  and  the  tenor  of  their 
daily  life  to  the  spirit  born  of  the  New  Learning. 
This  is  Petrarch's  pre-eminent  claim  to  the  grati- 
tude of  humanity.  He  was  hardly  a  better  Latinist 
than  John  of  Salisbury  ;  he  knew  less  Greek  than 
Robert  Grosseteste ;  but  to  his  efforts,  and  not  to 


THE   CROWN   OF   SONG  loi 

those  of  any  predecessor,  we  owe  it  that  the  culture 
of  the  Renaissance  became  a  Hving  force  in  the 
development  of  Europe.  In  this  sense,  our  modern 
life  may  be  said  to  date  from  the  ceremony  on  the 
Capitol. 


CHAPTER   VI 

PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE 

1341-1347 

PETRARCH  had  contemplated  a  stay  of  some 
few  days  in  Rome  ;  in  the  event  his  visit  was 
prolonged  a  day  beyond  his  intention.  Soon  after 
leaving  the  gates  he  encountered  one  of  those 
hordes  of  banditti  which  infested  the  Romagna,  and 
was  forced  to  return  to  the  city.  He  started  again 
the  next  day  with  a  stronger  escort,  and  reached 
Pisa  by  the  end  of  April.  Three  weeks  later  he 
rejoined  Azzo  and  took  part  in  his  triumphal  entry 
into  Parma.  For  the  past  two  years  the  Correggi 
had  been  busy  with  another  move  in  that  game  of 
intrigue  of  which  the  Lordship  of  Parma  was  the 
stake.  When  in  need  of  an  ally  against  the  Rossi, 
they  played  the  jackal,  as  we  have  seen,  to  Mastino 
della  Scala ;  but  the  Lord  of  Verona  took  some- 
thing more  than  the  lion's  share  of  the  prey,  and  the 
Correofofi  were  not  the  men  to  be  content  with  bare 
bones.  Azzo's  journeys  to  Avignon  and  Naples, 
which  coincided  so  happily  with  Petrarch's  move- 
ments, were  undertaken  to  obtain  Pope  Benedict's 
and  King  Robert's  consent  to  a  plan  for  getting 
Luchino  Visconti  of  Milan  to  help  in  expelling 
Mastino's  troops  from  Parma  and  transferring  the 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE   103 

sovereignty  of  the  city  to  Azzo  and  his  brothers. 
The  Visconti  were  ever  ready  to  fish  in  troubled 
waters,  and  Luchino  wilHngly  promised  assistance, 
in  return  for  which  the  Correggi  secretly  undertook 
to  hand  over  the  sovereignty  to  him  after  four 
years'  enjoyment  of  it.  It  is  not  quite  clear,  nor 
does  it  much  matter,  how  far  Benedict  and  Robert 
were  aware  of  this  secret  stipulation  :  it  seems  un- 
likely that  they  would  have  sanctioned  a  plan  for 
the  aggrandisement  of  their  worst  enemy ;  on  the 
other  hand,  they  must  have  known  the  Visconti 
character  too  well  to  suspect  Luchino  of  giving  any- 
thing for  nothing.  Probably  they  knew  of  the  agree- 
ment, and  trusted  Azzo,  the  arch-intriguer,  to  break 
his  promise  when  the  time  should  come  for  perform- 
ing it.  Be  this  as  it  may,  the  bargain  was  struck ; 
Luchino  sent  troops  from  Milan;  on  May  21st  the 
Veronese  garrison  was  expelled,  and  on  the  23  rd 
the  brothers  da  Correggio,  accompanied  by  Petrarch, 
made  their  state  entry  into  Parma  amid  a  great 
popular  demonstration  of  joy  and  welcome.  Prob- 
ably the  Veronese  domination  had  really  been 
oppressive,  and  the  bulk  of  the  people  may  have 
hailed  the  Correggi  as  genuine  liberators ;  while 
those  who  had  been  too  often  deluded  by  promises 
of  freedom  to  put  any  further  trust  in  princes  may 
have  thought  that,  tyrant  for  tyrant,  their  own 
nobles  were  at  any  rate  less  objectionable  than  a 
stranger.  And  for  a  year  or  two  things  went  well 
in  Parma  ;  while  Azzo  and  his  brothers  remained 
of  one  mind,  they  employed  their  brilliant  talents  in 
the  work  of  government,  and  really  did   much  to 


I04     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

lighten  the  burdens  and  improve  the  administration 
of  the  State. 

Everything  therefore  promised  well  for  the 
happiness  of  Petrarch's  first  sojourn  in  Parma, 
which  was  to  last  about  a  year.  But  not  even 
Azzo's  companionship  could  keep  him  permanently 
in  the  town  ;  mountain  and  woodland  called  him 
with  an  irresistible  charm  ;  and  on  the  great  spurs 
of  the  Apennines  above  Reggio,  where  the  River 
Enza  flows  down  from  Canossa  to  the  plain,  he 
found  a  pleasant  summer  refuge  from  the  heat  and 
dust  of  the  city.  Either  in  the  little  village  of 
Ciano  or  in  a  neighbouring  castle  owned  by  the 
Correggi,  he  spent  a  great  part  of  the  summer  ;  and 
here  one  day,  as  he  wandered  in  the  wood  which 
then  bore  the  name  of  Silva  Plana,  he  suddenly  be- 
thought him  of  the  poem  begun  some  years  ago  in 
the  solitude  of  Vaucluse.  Eagerly  he  resumed  the 
interrupted  work,  composing  a  few  lines  on  the 
spot,  and  going  on  with  it  every  day  till  his  return 
to  Parma.  Arrived  there,  he  hired  a  quiet  and 
secluded  little  house  and  garden,  situated  on  the 
outskirts  of  the  city,  which  pleased  him  so  well  that 
he  bought  it  a  few  years  later.  Here  he  applied 
himself  to  his  Africa  with  such  vigour  that  in  an 
incredibly  short  time  the  nine  books  of  the  poem 
were  complete. 

Doubtless  his  coronation  acted  as  a  sharp  stimulus 
to  his  powers ;  the  excitement  of  so  unique  an 
honour,  and  the  desire  to  justify  to  himself  and  to 
the  world  the  renown  which  he  enjoyed,  might  well 
have   stirred   a   less  sensitive  and  less  impetuous 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE   105 

nature  to  extraordinary  efforts.  Certain  it  is  that 
the  years  immediately  following  the  coronation  were 
years  of  incessant  literary  work ;  and  it  is  to  the 
period  between  1341  and  1361  that  we  owe  the 
great  bulk  of  the  compositions  which  may  be  called 
the  first-fruits  of  Humanism.  Some  estimate  of  the 
literary  value  and  effect  of  these  compositions  will 
be  attempted  in  a  later  chapter ;  here  it  is  sufficient 
to  note  that  the  crowning  honour  of  Petrarch's  life 
produced  in  him  not  a  sense  of  satiety  or  content- 
ment with  repose,  but,  on  the  contrary,  a  livelier 
and  keener  ambition,  a  noble  eagerness  to  deserve 
the  fame  w^hich  the  world  had  already  awarded  him. 
Those  who  cannot  see  beneath  the  superficial  flaws 
of  a  character  may  speak  contemptuously  of  his 
vanity,  his  affectations,  and  his  greed  of  fame ;  far 
other  is  the  estimate  of  those  who  have  read  his 
heart  and  know  the  high  idealism,  the  insatiable 
appetite  for  toil,  and  the  profound  sense  of  devotion 
to  his  calling,  which  lay  beneath  these  insignificant 
and  not  unlovable  foibles. 

A  remarkable  and  touching  illustration  of  his 
celebrity  is  furnished  by  the  visit  of  an  old  blind 
grammarian,  a  native  of  Perugia,  who  kept  a  school 
at  Pontremoli,  and  who  made  his  way  at  this  time 
to  Parma  solely  for  the  pleasure  of  spending  a  few 
hours  in  the  company  of  the  poet,  of  whose  corona- 
tion he  had  heard,  and  from  whose  scholarship  he 
anticipated,  what  indeed  it  was  chiefly  instrumental 
in  producing,  a  great  awakening  of  the  mind  of 
Europe. 

Over  this  bright  life  of  honoured  work,  pursued 


io6     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

alternately  in  happy  solitude  and  in  the  still  happier 
companionship  of  friends,  there  soon  came  a  cloud 
of  heavy  sorrow  ;  during  this  summer  Petrarch 
heard  of  the  death  of  the  friend  of  his  under- 
graduate days,  the  poet  Tommaso  Caloria  of 
Messina  ;  and  in  the  month  of  September  he  had 
to  bear  a  still  more  lamentable  loss.  News  had 
reached  him  that  Giacomo  Colonna  was  ill  at 
Lombez  ;  and  one  night  he  dreamed  that  he  saw 
him  walking  alone  and  hurriedly  on  the  bank  of  a 
little  stream  in  his  garden  at  Parma ;  he  hastened 
to  meet  him,  and  poured  out  question  after  question 
as  to  how  he  came  there,  and  whence  and  whither 
he  was  going ;  Giacomo,  he  thought,  smiled  brightly 
as  of  old,  and  said,  "  Do  you  remember  how  you 
hated  the  storms  in  the  Pyrenees  when  you  lived 
with  me  on  the  Garonne  ?  I  am  now  worn  out  by 
them,  and  am  going  away  from  them  to  Rome, 
never  to  return."  Petrarch  in  his  dream  would 
have  joined  himself  to  his  friend,  but  Giacomo 
waved  him  affectionately  away,  and  then  in  a  more 
decided  tone  said,  "  Stop,  I  will  not  have  you  this 
time  for  a  companion."  Then  Petrarch  noticed  the 
bloodless  pallor  of  his  face  and  knew  that  he  was 
dead,  and  woke  with  his  own  cry  of  grief  and 
horror  still  ringing  in  his  ears.  Nearly  a  month  later 
came  messengers  from  Provence  with  the  tidings 
that  Giacomo  had  died  at  the  very  time  when 
Petrarch  had  thus  seen  him  in  a  dream. 

The  new  year  (1342)  brought  him  yet  a  third 
bereavement  by  the  death  at  Naples  of  Fra  Dionigi 
da   Borgo   San  Sepolcro,   for  whom   King  Robert 


CLEMENS  Y[. 

mouicens.  creat'.die 
clit  an.iO.  meiis.y 
br.  an.i3s:i  .Vac 


7. Mai^  an .izf^Se- 
Ohijt  die  S  Decern 
Sed.  dies  11 . 


CLEMENT   VI 

KICOM    A    IMIKTKAIT    IN    TlIK    HUITISH    MUSEUM 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE   107 

had  three  years  previously  obtained  the  bishopric 
of  Monopoli.  Fra  Dionigi's  influence  was  the 
strono-est  ever  brought  to  bear  on  Petrarch's  mind 
and  character ;  as  we  have  seen,  he  knew  how  to 
foster  his  penitent's  reHgious  enthusiasm  without 
impairing  his  zeal  for  secular  learning,  and  to  his 
wise  advice  it  must  be  largely  due  that  Petrarch 
neither  sacrilied  his  intellect  on  the  altar  of  fanati- 
cism, nor  forgot  the  Christian  faith  in  reviving 
Augustan  culture. 

In  the  spring  of  this  year,  "sorely  against  the 
grain,"  he  bade  farewell  to  Italy  and  returned  to 
Avignon.  We  know  neither  the  precise  date  nor 
the  compelling  cause  of  his  return,  but  it  has  been 
plausibly  conjectured  that  Cardinal  Colonna  sum- 
moned him  back,  and  that  the  summons  may  have 
had  some  connection  with  the  Pope's  last  illness. 
Benedict  XII  died  on  April  25th,  and  on  May  7th 
Pierre  Rogrer  was  elected  to  succeed  him  and  took 
the  name  of  Clement  VI.  The  election  was  a 
victory  for  the  French  party,  but  the  new  Pope  was 
no  bitter  partisan  ;  his  official  name  was  not  ill- 
chosen  as  an  index  to  his  character ;  he  was  a 
"  douce  "  man,  self-indulgent  to  the  point  of  laxity, 
incapable  of  saying  No  to  friend  or  nephew,  but 
incapable  also  of  rancour,  amiable  in  disposition, 
cultivated  in  mind,  and  if  not  quite  a  scholar,  at 
least  an  intelligent  amateur  of  scholarship.  Petrarch 
speaks  of  him  as  "an  accomplished  man  of  letters, 
but  overwhelmed  with  business,  and  therefore  a 
devourer  of  digests."  Their  first  meeting  may  have 
occurred  in  connection  with  an  embassy  from  Rome, 


io8      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

which  will  be  more  fully  noticed  in  the  next  chapter; 
however  this  may  be,  the  new  Pope  soon  proved 
himself  a  good  friend  to  Petrarch.  "Clement  added 
to  my  fortunes,"  the  latter  tells  us  ;  and  we  shall 
see  that  the  addition  consisted  of  no  less  than  four 
benefices  conferred  on  himself  and  one  on  his  son, 
besides  an  informal  offer  of  the  papal  secretaryship, 
which  was  declined.  To  the  first  of  these  benefices, 
the  priory  of  St,  Nicolas  of  Miliarino,  in  the  diocese 
of  Pisa,  Petrarch  was  appointed  on  October  6th, 
1342. 

But  it  is  characteristic  of  him  that  the  first  use  he 
made  of  Clement  s  favour  was  to  obtain  preferment 
for  a  friend.  Barlaam,  the  "little  man  of  huge 
learning,"  had  come  back  as  a  theological  refugee  to 
Avignon.  He  was  a  poor  Latinist,  being  a  native 
of  Calabria,  where  to  this  day  the  peasants  speak  a 
patois  as  much  Greek  as  Latin  in  its  origin. 
Petrarch  knew  no  Greek  at  all,  and  was  acutely 
conscious  of  this  defect  in  his  training.  The  two 
friends  started  a  course  of  mutual  instruction  ;  but 
before  Petrarch  had  time  to  make  any  appreciable 
progress,  the  bishopric  of  Geraci,  in  Calabria,  fell 
vacant,  and  he  persuaded  the  Pope  to  bestow  it  on 
Barlaam  ;  and  so,  in  his  own  words, '"  deprived  him- 
self of  the  leader  under  whom  he  had  begun 
campaigning  with  no  small  hope  of  success." 

It  is  too  much  to  say  with  one  of  his  biographers 
that  this  lost  opportunity  prevented  him  from  found- 
ing the  Renaissance  on  a  Greek  instead  of  a  Latin 
basis  :  his  predilection  for  all  things  Roman  would, 
we  may  be  sure,  have  prevented  him  from  giving 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE   109 

the  preference  to  Greek  literature,  however  deeply 
he  might  have  felt  its  charm ;  but  it  is  permissible  to 
suppose  that,  if  he  and  Boccaccio  had  been  as  pro- 
ficient in  Greek  scholarship  as  they  were  enthusiastic 
for  it,  the  full  glory  of  the  Renaissance  might  have 
been  antedated  by  a  generation. 

Greek,  then,  had  to  be  given  up ;  but  with 
Petrarch  the  surrender  of  one  study  meant  closer 
application  to  others ;  he  was  incapable  of  idleness, 
and  the  winter  months,  spent  mostly  at  Vaucluse, 
but  with  frequent  visits  to  Avignon,  were  a  time  of 
incessant  mental  activity.  Many  of  the  Italian 
poems  are  referable  to  this  period,  and  he  was  prob- 
ably working  also  on  the  Lives  of  Illustrious  Men. 
But  above  all  this  sojourn  at  Vaucluse  is  notable 
for  the  writing  of  the  three  dialogues  On  Despising 
the  World,  which  to  those  who  feel  the  charm  of 
Petrarch's  nature  and  the  intense  humanity  of  his 
character  are  the  most  fascinatingr  of  all  his  writinos. 
He  called  them  his  Secretuvi;  in  the  form  of  dialogues 
between  Saint  Augustine  and  himself  he  took  the 
Saint,  as  it  were,  for  his  confessor,  and  laid  bare  to 
him  his  inmost  heart.     The  dialoorues  Q-ive  as  faith- 

o  o 

ful  a  portrait  as  a  man  may  hope  to  paint  of  his 
own  personality  ;  the  light  of  them  penetrates  the 
veil  and  makes  visible  to  us  the  mechanism  of  the 
soul.  We  see  the  Humanist,  self-conscious,  self- 
questioning,  taking  himself,  as  it  were,  for  audience, 
and  expressing  even  his  solitary  musings  through 
ordered  forms  of  rhetoric ;  but  beneath  this  surface 
aspect  we  see  even  more  clearly  the  passionate  soul, 
earnest  in  thought,  sincere  in  faith,  nobly  tenacious 


no      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

of  its  ideals;  and  through  all  the  rhetoric  of  balanced 
question  and  answer  rings  the  note  of  genuine 
emotion.  Very  likely  Petrarch  may  have  foreseen 
the  probability  that  these  dialogues  would  be  pub- 
lished after  his  death  ;  very  likely  he  may  even  have 
found  pleasure  in  the  idea  that  posterity  would  one 
day  look  deep  into  his  heart.  None  the  less  in 
writing  them  he  meant  to  be  his  own  sole  and 
sincere  confidant  during  his  lifetime ;  they  were 
truly  his  Secretum;  and  the  elaboration  of  their  style 
is  due  less  to  their  author's  habitual  cravingf  to 
deserve  and  win  renown,  than  to  his  instinctive 
feeling  that  the  deep  matters  of  the  soul  demand 
the  utmost  pains  that  the  artist  can  bestow  on  their 
interpretation. 

The  interest  of  the  Secrehmt  quickens  to  pathos 
when  we  find  that  its  composition  synchronises  with 
Petrarch's  last  battle  and  final  victory  over  his 
natural  frailty.  In  the  spring  of  1343  his  daughter 
Francesca  was  born  ;  thenceforward,  as  he  tells  us, 
while  still  in  the  full  vigour  of  manhood,  be  became 
master  of  his  passions,  and  lived  free  from  the  sin 
which  he  had  always  loathed.  He  bestowed  the  same 
conscientious  care  on  Francesca's  nurture  as  on 
Giovanni's,  and  with  far  happier  results;  gifted  with 
an  amiable  disposition,  and  trained  apparently  by 
judicious  guardians,  the  girl  grew  up  to  be  the  chief 
solace  and  delight  of  her  father's  latter  years. 

From  his  quiet  scholar's  life  at  Vaucluse  Petrarch 
was  presently  recalled  to  the  world  of  politics  and 
intrigue  by  the  lamentable  course  of  events  at 
Naples.      King   Robert  died   full    of  years  and  of 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND   VAUCLUSE   iii 

honour  in  January,  1343,  and  immediately  his  king- 
dom sank  into  indescribable  anarchy  and  corruption. 
It  was  as  if  the  Wise  King,  like  the  physician  in 
Foe's  horrible  story  of  arrested  decomposition,  had 
been  able  to  galvanise  the  dead  body-politic,  but 
only  with  the  result  that,  as  soon  as  his  controlling 
power  was  withdrawn,  the  accumulated  foulness  of 
years  became  manifest  in  an  instant.  Robert's  heir 
was  his  granddaughter  Joanna,  a  girl  of  sixteen, 
married  in  her  childhood  to  her  cousin  Prince 
Andrew  of  Hungary,  who  was  only  a  year  her 
senior.  Once  again  a  parallel  suggests  itself  be- 
tween the  House  of  Stuart  and  the  Angevin  House 
of  the  Two  Sicilies.  In  Naples,  as  in  Scotland,  we 
have  a  young  queen  of  wilful  temper  and  un- 
governed  passions ;  a  consort  of  mean  abilities  and 
dissolute  inclinations  ;  presently  a  murder,  of  which 
the  husband  is  the  victim,  and  the  wife  is  commonly 
believed  to  be  an  accomplice,  if  not  the  instigator. 
Certain  it  is  that  she  made  indecent  haste  to  marry 
her  paramour,  whose  brother  was  the  actual  mur- 
derer. The  tragedy,  in  the  earlier  as  in  the  later 
case,  took  time  to  work  out,  and  Petrarch  could 
have  no  more  than  a  vague  suspicion  of  doom  im- 
pending over  his  old  patron's  family  when  he  paid 
his  second  visit  to  the  city  ;  but  already  there  was 
more  than  enough  to  disgust  him  as  a  man  and 
distress  him  as  an  Italian  patriot. 

The  voyage  began  with  an  omen  of  misfortune. 
Starting  by  sea,  he  was  shipwrecked  off  Nice,  and 
seems  to  have  continued  his  journey  by  land.  On 
October  4th  he  reached  Rome ;  on  the  6th  he  went 


112      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

with  Stefano  Colonna  the  Elder  to  Praeneste,  as  the 
guest  of  Stefano's  grandson  Giovanni  ;  on  the  1 2th 
he  arrived  at  Naples.  The  primary  object  of  his 
mission  was  to  treat  for  the  release  from  prison  of 
some  turbulent  friends  of  the  Colonna  family,  who 
had  got  the  worst  of  a  conspiracy ;  but  as  the 
Pope's  envoy  he  would  naturally  be  expected  to 
report  on  the  situation,  and  two  letters  to  Cardinal 
Colonna  paint  a  gloomy  picture.  Power  was  in  the 
hands  of  an  unscrupulous  Hungarian  friar,  a  man  of 
abandoned  life  and  filthy  habits,  who  by  the  irony 
of  chance  bore  the  name  of  Robert,  as  if  to  point 
the  contrast  with  the  Wise  King  whose  heritage  he 
misruled.  Supported  by  a  cabal  of  intriguers  male 
and  female,  "this  fierce  inhuman  beast  oppresses 
the  lowly,  spurns  justice,  and  pollutes  all  authority 
human  and  divine."  Foreseeing  something  of  what 
might  happen  after  his  death.  King  Robert  had 
appointed  Philip  de  Cabassoles  head  of  a  Council  of 
Regency,  which  should  hold  office  till  Queen  Joanna 
completed  her  twenty-fifth  year;  he  now  "alone 
embraces  the  side  of  forlorn  justice ;  but  what  can 
one  lamb  do  amid  such  a  pack  of  wolves?"  Property 
and  life  were  alike  insecure ;  the  very  Council 
"must  end  its  sittings  at  the  approach  of  evening, 
for  the  turbulent  young  nobles  make  the  streets 
quite  unsafe  after  dark.  And  what  wonder  if  they 
are  unruly  and  society  corrupt,  when  the  public 
authorities  actually  countenance  all  the  horrors  of 
gladiatorial  games  ?  This  disgusting  exhibition 
takes  place  in  open  day  before  the  Court  and  popu- 
lace, in  this  city  of  Italy,  with  more  than  barbaric 


PARMA,    NAPLES,    AND  VAUCLUSE   113 

ferocity."  Knowini^  nothinj:^  of  what  he  was  to  see, 
Petrarch  was  taken  to  a  spectacle  attended  by  the 
sovereigns  in  state ;  suddenly  to  his  horror  he  saw 
a  beautiful  youth,  killed  for  pastime,  expiring  at  his 
feet,  and  putting  spurs  to  his  horse  fled  at  full  gallop 
from  the  place. 

His  mission  was  a  failure;  he  argued  the  prisoners' 
case  before  the  Council,  and  on  one  occasion  came 
very  near  succeeding ;  but  the  Council  broke  up 
without  coming  to  a  decision.  Indirect  influence 
seemed  equally  unsuccessful:  "the  elder  Queen 
pities,  but  declares  herself  powerless ;  Cleopatra 
and  her  Ptolemy  might  take  compassion  if  their 
Photinus  and  Achillas  gave  them  leave."  Eventu- 
ally the  men  were  set  at  liberty,  but  not  till  after 
Petrarch  had  left  the  city,  and  then  only  through 
the  young  Queen's  personal  intercession. 

** Cleopatra"  honoured  her  grandfather's  friend 
personally,  and  appointed  him  her  chaplain ;  but 
this  was  poor  compensation  for  the  misery  of  wit- 
nessing the  ruin  of  Naples.  A  far  greater  consola- 
tion was  the  companionship  of  his  friends  Barbato 
and  Barili,  whose  society  he  enjoyed  throughout  his 
two  months'  stay,  and  with  whom  he  made  long  and 
delightful  excursions  in  the  surrounding  country. 

From  the  horrors  of  Naples,  of  which  an  appal- 
ling storm  in  the  bay  was  perhaps  the  least,  Petrarch 
fled  away  in  December  to  Parma.  Here  too  he 
was  in  a  focus  of  intrigue  ;  but  the  city  was  now 
his  Italian  home,  where  he  could  live  his  own  life  and 
pursue  his  studies  at  his  pleasure.  Moreover,  the 
intrigues  here,  however  much  fighting  they  might 


114     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

entail,  were  conducted  accordincf  to  the  usages  of 
polite  society,  and  the  arch-intriguer  was  his  friend. 

The  chronology  of  the  next  two  years  is  so  diffi- 
cult, that  even  Fracassetti,  the  indefatigable  editor 
and  annotator  of  the  Letters,  has  made  mutually 
inconsistent  statements  with  regard  to  it ;  the  follow- 
ing version  is  given  with  some  diffidence  as  best 
fitting  in  with  the  known  facts  and  dates. 

Petrarch  reached  Parma  about  Christmas,  1343, 
and  stayed  there  till  February,  1345  ;  of  his  doings 
there  we  have  no  record.  The  times  were  troublous; 
the  brothers  da  Correggio  were  quarrelling ;  and 
Azzo,  rather  than  surrender  the  sovereignty  as 
promised  to  Luchino  Visconti,  sold  it  to  the 
Marquis  of  Ferrara.  Thereupon  Milan  and  Mantua 
formed  a  league,  and  in  November,  1344,  their 
allied  forces  laid  siege  to  Parma.  For  three  months 
Petrarch  endured  the  disquiet  and  discomfort  of  life 
in  a  beleagured  town  ;  then  "  a  great  longing  for 
his  transalpine  Helicon  came  upon  him,  since  his 
Italian  Helicon  was  ablaze  with  war,"  and  he  deter- 
mined to  break  out  at  all  hazards.  About  sunset 
on  February  24th  he  and  a  few  companions  sallied 
forth  unarmed  from  the  city ;  about  midnight  they 
were  near  Reggio,  a  stronghold  of  the  enemy. 
Here  they  fell  in  with  armed  banditti,  who  threatened 
their  lives ;  unable  to  resist,  they  fled  at  top  speed 
in  different  directions  through  the  darkness.  Pet- 
rarch was  just  congratulating  himself  on  his  escape, 
when  his  horse  fell  at  some  obstacle,  and  he  was 
thrown  heavily  to  the  ground,  half  stunned,  and  so 
badly  bruised  on  one  arm  that  it  was  some  days 


PARMA,    NAPLES,    AND  VAUCLUSE   115 

before  he  could  put  his  hand  to  his  mouth.  As 
soon  as  possible  he  recovered  his  horse,  and  pre- 
sently found  a  few  of  his  companions  ;  the  rest  had 
ridden  back  to  Parma.  The  night  was  pitch  dark, 
and  rain  and  hail  fell  in  torrents,  so  that  the  little 
party  were  forced  to  take  shelter  under  their  horses' 
bellies.  When  the  dawn  came,  they  travelled  by 
by-ways  to  Scandiano,  a  friendly  town,  where  they 
learned  that  a  body  of  the  enemy  had  been  lying  in 
wait  to  intercept  them,  and  had  only  just  gone  back 
to  quarters.  Here  Petrarch's  arm  was  bandaged, 
and  they  went  on  to  Modena,  and  thence,  on  the 
following  day,  to  Bologna. 

Soon  afterwards  he  made  his  way  to  Verona,  and 
here  he  was  compensated  for  all  recent  perils  and  dis- 
comforts by  one  of  the  biggest  literary  "finds"  ever 
vouchsafed  to  a  book-hunter's  diligence.  In  a  church 
library  he  came  across  a  manuscript  of  Cicero's  letters. 
It  has  generally  been  supposed  that  the  treasure- 
trove  comprised  both  the  Faviiliar  Letters  and  those 
to  Atticus,  but  there  is  some  reason  to  think  that  only 
the  latter  were  found  on  this  occasion.  However 
that  may  be,  here  was  a  discovery  for  which,  even 
had  it  stood  alone,  the  world  must  have  hailed 
Petrarch  its  benefactor,  and  seldom  has  Fortune 
played  so  happy  a  stroke  as  that  by  which  she  gave 
to  Cicero's  most  ardent  and  most  distin2!"uished 
pupil  the  supreme  delight  of  being  the  first  to  see 
his  master  in  the  intimacy  of  private  converse.  The 
fact  that  Cicero  had  published  letters  was  well 
known,  and  scholars  had  made  eager  but  hitherto 
fruitless  search  for  the  precious  manuscripts.     Now 


ii6      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

at  last  the  author  to  whom  they  all  looked  as 
"  father  and  chief  of  oratory  and  style  "  stood  re- 
vealed also  as  the  brightest  of  correspondents,  the 
wittiest  of  gossips,  the  most  human  of  friends  ;  and 
Petrarch  noted  with  special  delight  that  Cicero,  like 
himself,  could  communicate  every  passing  thought 
and  share  every  momentary  doubt  with  the  friend 
who  had  won  his  heart.  He  lost  not  a  moment  in 
making  a  copy  of  the  treasure  with  his  own  hands  ; 
and  the  discovery  also  inspired  him  with  the  idea  of 
writing  the  first  of  his  two  letters  to  Cicero,  by 
which  he  set  the  fashion  of  embodying  historical 
criticism  in  the  form  of  letters  to  dead  authors. 

Petrarch  seems  to  have  spent  the  whole  summer 
in  Verona,  in  happy  companionship  with  Gulielmo 
da  Pastrengo,  and  with  Azzo  da  Correggio,  who 
had  fled  thither  on  the  failure  of  his  plot  in  Parma. 
During  his  stay  here  he  probably  sent  for  his  son 
Giovanni,  now  a  boy  of  eight  years  old,  and  placed 
him  under  the  charge  of  Rinaldo  da  Villafranca,  a 
well-known  professor  of  grammar  in  Verona.  In 
the  autumn  he  left  Verona  for  Avignon,  and 
Gulielmo  accompanied  him  on  his  journey  as  far  as 
Peschiera,  on  the  Brescian  border.  A  letter  from 
Gulielmo,  interesting  because  so  few  of  the  letters 
written  to  Petrarch  by  his  friends  have  been  pre- 
served, tells  of  their  journey  to  the  little  frontier 
town  ;  the  night  spent  almost  wholly  in  talk,  the 
start  before  sunrise,  and  the  affectionate  parting,  on 
a  knoll  overlooking  the  Lago  di  Garda. 

Nothing  further  is  known  of  Petrarch's  journey 
back  to  Avignon  or  of  the  date  of  his  arrival,  except 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE    117 

that  he  was  certainly  there  by  the  middle  of  Decem- 
ber ;  he  may  quite  possibly  have  arrived  a  month  or 
two  earlier. 

The  next  two  years  were  spent  principally  at 
Vaucluse.  As  on  former  occasions,  his  life  there 
was  diversified  by  frequent  visits  to  Avignon,  and 
there  are  many  signs  that  he  was  fully  in  touch  with 
the  life  of  the  Papal  Court,  and  with  the  course  of 
events  in  Provence  and  in  Italy.  With  Clement  VI 
he  stood  higher  in  favour  than  ever;  in  either  1346 
or  1347  the  Pope  offered  him  the  post  of  Papal 
Secretary  and  Protonotary,  and  though  Petrarch 
wisely  declined  an  honour  which  would  have  taken 
him  from  his  proper  business  of  scholarship  to  over- 
whelm him  with  the  uncono^enial  burdens  of  official 
correspondence  and  court  intrigues,  the  refusal  in 
no  way  diminished  Clement's  anxiety  to  promote 
his  interests ;  in  October,  1346,  he  conferred  on  him 
a  canonry  at  Parma,  and  in  1348  gave  him  the 
higher  dignity  of  Archdeacon  there.  Once  again 
it  is  pleasant  to  find  that  Petrarch's  first  thought  on 
receiving  an  accession  of  wealth  was  to  offer  help 
to  a  friend.  It  must  have  been  about  the  time 
of  his  nomination  to  the  canonry  that  he  wrote  to 
an  unknown  correspondent :  **  I  heard  something 
the  other  day  from  one  who  knew  about  the  state 
of  your  money  chest,  and  I  have  determined  to  be 
so  bold  as  to  come  to  its  assistance.  Here  then 
is  an  offering — I  will  not  say  from  the  surplusage  of 
my  fortune,  for  that  would  sound  unpleasantly  like 
bragging,  nor  does  the  mere  phrase  '  Fortune's 
bounty '  quite  express  my  meaning,  so  I  will  say 


ii8      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

that  I  have  sent  you  a  trifle  from  the  bounties  which 
Fortune  has  deigned  to  heap  on  me,  who  busy  not 
myself  with  such  things,  beyond  all  expectation  or 
wish  of  mine  ;  and  however  small  the  gift,  I  doubt 
not  but  that  you  will  deign  to  accept  it,  and  in  this 
little  thing,  as  in  a  tiny  mirror,  you  will  see  the 
sender's  great  affection,  and  will  weigh  the  magni- 
tude  of  his   oroodwill   against  the   littleness  of  his 

o  o 

gift." 

Petrarch,  then,  maintained  his  place  in  the  Pope's 
favour  and  his  connection  with  friends  at  Avignon  ; 
but  residence  in  the  city  was  as  distasteful  to  him 
as  ever,  and  Vaucluse  was  his  home  for  the  next 
two  years.  There  is  an  undated  letter  to  Guido 
Settimo,  almost  certainly  written  at  this  time,  in 
which  he  speaks  of  himself  as  still  suffering  from 
the  smart  of  his  old  wound,  and  praying,  as  yet 
unsuccessfully,  for  deliverance.  The  allusion  is  un- 
mistakable ;  time  had  done  something  to  mitigate 
the  violence  of  his  passion,  but  his  love  for  Laura 
was  still  the  dominant  sentiment  of  his  heart.  Vau- 
cluse gave  him  peace  ;  here  he  found  full  oppor- 
tunity for  quiet  study  of  books  and  of  nature,  with 
just  so  much  companionship  of  intimate  friends  as 
might  serve  to  keep  his  faculties  alert  and  his  affec- 
tions keen.  Never  surely  has  a  storm-tossed  soul 
taken  refuge  in  a  more  perfect  haven.  Visit  the 
spot  to-day,  and  you  find  a  busy  little  township 
clustered  round  a  few  mills  whose  wheels  are  driven 
by  the  Sorgue.  But  it  is  easy  to  ignore  the 
modern  buildings,  to  dot  the  lower  slopes  in  fancy 
with  patches  of  woodland,  and  to  picture  the  place 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE   iic) 

as  Petrarch  knew  It.  There  has  been  no  appreci- 
able change  in  the  apparently  perfect  circle  of  steep 
hills  crested  with  limestone  crags,  in  the  great  silent 
pool  where  the  river  rises  under  the  shadow  of  a 
cliff  350  feet  high ;  or  in  the  long  rock-strewn  falls 
through  which  it  rushes  noisily  to  the  valley-level. 
The  very  fig  tree  growing  between  the  rocks  at  the 
head  of  the  cataract  may  be  the  descendant  of  one 
from  which  Petrarch  could  offer  Cardinal  Colonna  a 
dish  of  figs  drawn,  like  his  jug  of  drinking  water,  from 
mid-stream.  The  little  church  may  have  stood  on 
its  present  site  ;  the  Bishop  of  Cavaillon  s  castle, 
now  a  picturesque  ruin,  was  then  an  almost  impreg- 
nable fortress  crowning  a  steep  hill  600  feet  high  ; 
only  there  was  no  thriving  French  village,  but  at 
most  a  few  peasants'  cottages  dotted  about  the 
valley,  with  Petrarch's  own  house  standing  probably 
on  the  site  now  occupied  by  one  of  the  mills,  with 
his  meadow  bordering  the  stream,  and  his  two 
gardens,  the  upper  one  on  the  slope  by  the  cataract, 
the  lower  one  originally  perhaps  a  peninsula  jutting 
into  the  river-bed,  and  by  him  converted  into  an 
island  by  the  cutting  of  a  little  channel  now  utilised 
as  a  mill-race. 

Here  in  the  years  1346  and  1347  Petrarch  "waged 
war  with  the  nymphs  of  the  Sorgue,  seeking  to 
annex  enough  of  their  domain  to  build  a  habitation 
for  the  Muses."  Gardening  gave  him  recreation; 
for  work  we  know  with  certainty  that  this  is  the 
date  of  his  treatise  in  two  books  On  the  Solitary 
Life,  which  he  dedicated  to  the  Bishop  of  Cavaillon. 
Philip  watched  over  the  composition  of  the  treatise. 


I20     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

though  it  was  not  till  many  years  later  that  Petrarch 
sent  him  a  copy  of  the  finished  work.  And  in  1347 
a  visit  to  his  brother  Gherardo  at  his  monastery 
furnished  him  with  the  subject  of  his  essay  On  the 
Repose  of  Men  vowed  to  Religion. 

It  was  to  the  troubles  of  Naples  that  Petrarch  owed 
the  pleasure  of  the  Bishop's  society.  Andrew  of  Hun- 
gary had  been  murdered  in  September,  1345;  Queen 
Joanna  speedily  married  the  murderer's  brother,  her 
cousin.  Prince  Lewis  of  Tarentum ;  King  Lewis  of 
Hungary  led  an  expedition  into  Italy  to  avenge  his 
brother's  death  ;  and  Philip,  sick  of  his  position  as 
nominal  head  of  an  ineffective  Regency,  left  Naples 
in  disgust,  and  came  back  to  his  diocese  and  to  his 
castle  above  Vaucluse.  Petrarch's  grief  at  the  ruin 
of  Naples,  poured  out  in  a  letter  of  lamentation  to 
Barbato,  was  deep  and  sincere  ;  but  in  intercourse 
with  Philip  he  found  perhaps  an  adequate  com- 
pensation for  his  distress. 

In  January,  1347,  he  had  the  exquisite  pleasure 
of  taking  Socrates  to  pay  a  visit  to  the  Bishop  at 
Cavaillon  ;  the  charming  little  letter  in  which  he 
accepted  the  latter's  invitation  deserves  to  be  trans- 
lated in  full.      It  runs  thus  : — 

**  I  will  come  to  you  at  the  time  when  I  know 
you  will  be  glad  to  see  me,  and  I  will  bring  with  me 
our  Socrates,  who  is  your  most  devoted  admirer. 
We  will  come  the  day  after  to-morrow ;  and  we  will 
not  shrink  from  the  sight  of  a  city,  though  we  shall 
be  dressed  in  rough  country  clothes.  For  we  fled 
hither  two  days  since,  hurriedly  and  as  at  a  bound, 
from  the  restless  tumult   of  the   town,  like   ship- 


PARMA,    NAPLES,   AND  VAUCLUSE   121 

wrecked  sailors  making  for  shore,  planning  for  our- 
selves a  time  of  unharried  quiet,  and  in  the  dress 
which  seemed  most  appropriate  for  the  country  in 
winter.  You  bid  us  betake  ourselves  just  as  we  are 
to  your  city ;  we  will  obey  all  the  more  willingly  as 
we  are  drawn  by  eager  longing  for  your  com- 
pany. Nor  will  we  care  greatly  how  our  outer  man 
looks  in  your  eyes,  to  whom  we  both  wish  and 
believe  that  our  souls  stand  visible  and  undraped. 
One  thing,  most  loving  father,  you  will  not  deny 
to  the  wishes  of  your  friends  :  if  you  wish  to  have 
us  often  as  your  guests,  you  will  let  us  share  no 
special  banquet  of  dainties,  but  your  usual  meal. 
Farewell." 


p 


CHAPTER   VII 

ROME   AND   RIENZI 

1347 

ETRARCH'S  life  was  full  of  startling  contrasts 
and  sharp  surprises ;  but  in  all  his  career's 
vicissitudes  no  external  event  ever  stirred  his 
emotions  quite  so  violently  as  the  Roman  crisis  of 
1347.  The  gardener  of  Vaucluse,  the  philosophical 
essayist  on  saints  and  hermits,  the  poet  of  a  tran- 
quillised  but  constant  devotion,  became  in  an  instant 
the  fervid  politician,  the  people's  champion,  the 
prophet  of  a  revolution.  The  society  in  which  he 
lived  was  hostile  to  his  ideals  ;  he  cared  not  whom 
he  offended  by  his  advocacy  of  them  ;  his  patron 
and  lifelong  friend  was  of  the  opposite  faction ; 
even  gratitude  and  friendship  must  give  place  to 
the  patriot's  zeal ;  blows  were  being  struck  for 
Rome,  and  with  all  his  soul  Petrarch  believed  that 
the  cause  of  Rome  was  the  cause  of  God. 

Fully  to  comprehend  the  high  hopes  excited  in 
him  by  Rienzi,  the  hot  enthusiasm  with  which  he 
championed  the  Tribune  in  the  face  of  a  sceptical 
and  unfriendly  world,  and  the  bitterness  of  his 
disappointment  when  the  cynics  were  justified 
of  their  unbelief,  and  the  gallant  enterprise  failed 
like  any  base  intrigue  of  faction,  we  must  realise 


ROME    AND    RIENZI  123 

how  all  his  ideals  of  government  and  all  his 
hopes  of  progress  were  based  and  centred  in  the 
eagerly  desired  restoration  of  Roman  supremacy. 
From  his  father  he  inherited  the  political  creed  of 
the  White  Guelfs  expounded  by  Dante  in  the  De 
Monarckid.  Pope  and  Emperor  were  alike  the 
consecrated  vice-gerents  of  God  on  earth  ;  each  in 
his  allotted  sphere  must  rule  the  spiritual  and 
temporal  world  in  conformity  with  the  Divine  Will ; 
both  were  "  Holy  Roman,"  and  both,  as  Petrarch 
insisted  more  fervently  than  any  of  his  predecessors, 
must  regard  Rome  as  their  capital  city,  and  must 
have  a  special  care  of  Italy,  "  the  Garden  of  the 
Empire."  Their  authority  over  distant  provinces 
might  be  delegated  to  vicars  and  vassals  ;  but  Italy 
was  their  home,  the  motherland  of  the  imperial 
race,  in  whose  chief  city  resided,  dormant  perhaps 
but  indefeasible,  the  right  to  rule  the  world  ;  and 
both  Pope  and  Emperor  were  bound  to  make  the 
government  of  Italy  their  chief  and  personal  care. 
In  all  this  there  was  nothing  peculiar  to  Petrarch  ; 
the  Emperors  claimed  to  be  the  legitimate  suc- 
cessors of  the  Csesars ;  the  Popes  appealed  to  the 
Donation  of  Constantine  as  their  title  to  exclusive 
sovereignty  in  Rome  ;  the  claims  of  both  were  theo- 
retically reconciled  by  the  White  Guelf  creed.  Nor 
was  Petrarch's  personal  enthusiasm  for  Rome  a  new 
sentiment  in  the  world ;  the  tradition  of  her  great- 
ness and  the  aspiration  for  its  revival  had  never 
quite  died  away,  and  a  generation  before  Petrarch 
wrote  his  first  letter  to  Benedict  XII,  Giovanni 
Villani    had    been    inspired   by   the   sight    of    the 


124     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Eternal  City  and  the  memory  of  her  past  glories 
to  set  to  work  on  his  incomparable  Florentine 
Chronicle.  What  differentiates  Petrarch's  enthusi- 
asm for  Rome  from  the  sentiments  of  any  prede- 
cessor is  his  conception  of  the  continuity  of  her 
history.  He  regards  its  periods  not  as  separate 
episodes  connected  only  by  an  accidental  tie  of 
locality,  but  as  successive  stages  in  an  ordered 
development,  phases  bright  or  dark  in  one  deathless 
career,  destined  to  lead,  through  whatever  diffi- 
culties and  trials,  to  the  glorious  consummation  of 
invincible  empire.  Looking  thus  upon  her  history 
as  a  whole,  political  forms  and  ordinances  became 
to  him  mere  secondary  matters ;  the  Pope  and  the 
Emperor  themselves  were  but  instruments  designed 
to  secure  the  supremacy  of  the  Roman  people,  the 
people  for  whom  Romulus  built  his  sacred  wall, 
whose  supremacy  Scipio  assured  by  his  victory  over 
Carthage,  for  whose  safety  Cicero  unmasked  the 
conspiracy  of  Catiline.  If  only  either  Pope  or 
Emperor  would  devote  himself  to  the  service  of  the 
Roman  people,  Petrarch  would  be  a  good  Papalist, 
a  loyal  Imperialist.  Alas  !  both  were  sadly  neglect- 
ful of  their  high  mission  ;  both  were  thinking  only 
of  their  own  petty  interests  ;  neither  of  them  would 
live  in  Rome  or  work  for  her.  Suddenly,  like 
thunder  from  a  clear  sky,  came  the  astounding  news 
that  Rome  had  found  her  champion  ;  that  a  man  of 
obscure  origin  but  of  lofty  aims  had  made  his 
appeal  to  the  noblest  of  her  traditions ;  that  he  had 
set  himself  to  revive  the  great  age  of  her  history, 
the  age  when  the  people  was  really  sovereign,  and 


(jua^uantn/i     ^'fU:-- 


RIENZI 

I'KOM    A.N    riALlAN'    I'KINT 


I 

1 


ROME    AND    RIENZI  125 

had  taken  for  himself  the  title  of  Tribune  as  an 
earnest  that  he  would  be  as  the  Gracchi,  that  he 
would  stand  for  the  people  and  break  the  yoke  of 
their  oppressors  from  off  their  necks.  Petrarch's 
course  lay  before  him  clear  and  unmistakable : 
Rienzi  was  trying  to  realise  his  own  ideals  ;  at  any 
sacrifice  of  private  interests,  even  of  private  friend- 
ships, he  must  go  with  the  champion  of  the  Roman 
people. 

Niccola  di  Lorenzo  Gabrini,  known  to  his  own 
generation  as  Cola  di  Rienzo,  and  to  ours  by  the 
further  modification  "  Rienzi,"  was  the  son  of  a 
Roman  innkeeper,  who,  finding  the  boy  possessed 
of  unusual  talent,  sent  him  to  a  school  of  grammar 
and  rhetoric.  Fired  with  enthusiasm  for  the  classics, 
Rienzi  completed  his  own  education  by  diligent 
study  of  the  ancient  monuments  and  inscriptions, 
which  lay  neglected  in  the  modern  city.  For  a 
livelihood  he  adopted  the  profession  of  notary,  but 
his  leisure  was  spent  in  studying  the  history  of  old 
Rome,  and  in  dreaming  how  her  oflories  mieht  be 
revived.  He  was  by  temperament  a  dreamer ;  a 
domestic  tragedy  made  him  a  man  of  action.  His 
brother  was  killed  in  a  tumult ;  the  political  idealist 
was  thenceforth  the  avenger  of  blood.  He  would 
exalt  Rome  by  breaking  the  power  of  the  barons 
who  misgoverned  her.  He  had  self-restraint  enough 
to  await  his  opportunity.  Meanwhile  his  talents, 
and  especially  his  splendid  gift  of  oratory,  made 
him  a  conspicuous  figure  in  Rome.  Soon  after 
Clement  VI's  accession — there  is  some  doubt  as  to 
the   exact  date,   but   it   was  either  in  the  summer 


126     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

of  1342  or  early  in  1343 — he  went  to  Avignon  as 
chief  spokesman  of  an  embassy  sent  by  the  magi- 
stracy and  people  of  Rome  to  the  Pope.  Here  he 
must  have  met  Petrarch,  here  in  all  probability 
their  friendship  began.  There  is  even  a  tradition, 
unsupported  by  evidence,  that  the  poet  was  associ- 
ated with  Rienzi  as  spokesman  of  the  embassy ; 
however  this  may  be,  it  is  safe  to  assume  that 
Rome's  youngest  burgess,  fresh  from  his  coronation 
on  the  Capitol,  must  have  used  his  influence  at 
court  in  favour  of  his  fellow-citizens.  There  is 
indeed  a  passage  at  the  end  of  Petrarch's  magnifi- 
cent ode  Spirto  Gentil^  from  which  some  biographers 
have  inferred  either  that  the  two  men  had  never 
met  previously  to  the  composition  of  the  ode,  or 
that  it  must  have  been  addressed  not  to  Rienzi,  but 
to  some  other  eminent  citizen  of  Rome.  But  the 
passage  in  question  easily  admits  of  an  interpretation 
consistent  with  the  narrative  here  given  ;  the  rest 
of  the  ode  tallies  perfectly  with  Rienzi  and  the 
events  of  1347,  and  with  no  other  person  or  events 
of  the  period ;  and  the  tone  of  Petrarch's  earlier 
letters  to  the  Tribune  implies  a  friendship  founded 
on  personal  acquaintance,  as  well  as  on  community 
of  ideas.  It  is  equally  safe  to  assume  that  inter- 
course with  Petrarch  acted  as  a  keen  stimulus  to 
Rienzi.  He  came  to  Avignon  as  a  man  honoured 
in  his  own  city,  but  unknown  beyond  it,  nursing  in 
his  mind  great  hopes,  which  so  far  he  had  found  no 
opportunity  of  communicating  to  others.  Here  he 
discovered  that  those  hopes  were  shared  by  one 
who  could  make   Europe   ring  with   the  praise  of 


ROME    AND    RIENZI  127 

them,  a  man  not  only  famous  as  the  first  poet  and 
scholar  of  his  age,  but  sought  out  by  princes  to  be 
their  friend  and  counsellor,  and  standing  high  in  the 
favour  of  Pope  Clement  himself. 

The  embassy  had  little  if  any  tangible  result ; 
but  Rienzi's  eloquent  exposition  of  the  troubles  and 
needs  of  Rome  is  said  to  have  made  a  favourable 
impression  on  the  Pope,  and  this  may  help  to  ex- 
plain the  benevolent  attitude  of  his  Vicar  four  years 
later.  Of  the  urgent  need  for  reform  there  could 
be  no  doubt.  Since  the  Pope's  departure  Rome  had 
had  no  settled  government ;  a  series  of  faction-fights 
had  constituted  her  history,  the  will  of  the  tempo- 
rary victors  her  law.  Municipal  affairs  were  sup- 
posed to  be  administered  by  the  popularly  elected 
heads  of  the  thirteen  city  wards  ;  but  these  Capo- 
rioni,  as  they  were  called,  had  no  force  at  their 
back,  and  their  office  was  an  empty  survival  from  a 
former  Constitution.  The  machinery  of  govern- 
ment was  in  the  hands  of  the  Senator,  a  chief 
magistrate  nominated  annually  by  the  Pope  from 
the  ranks  of  the  nobles.  If  the  Senator  was  a 
strong  man  in  alliance  with  the  barons  of  the  pre- 
dominant faction,  he  was  feared  and  obeyed  ;  but 
officially  he  was  hardly  more  powerful  than  the 
Caporioni.  He  could  never  be  impartial,  for  he 
was  never  independent.  The  House  of  Colonna, 
the  House  of  the  Orsini,  these  were  by  turns  the 
effective  rulers  of  Rome,  and  their  government  was 
sheer  brigrandacre. 

Rienzi,  on  his  return  home,  set  himself  to  evolve 
civil  order  out  of  this  anarchy.    He  presently  began 


128     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

a  series  of  harangues  to  the  people,  which  involved 
him  in  frequent  quarrels  with  the  nobles.  Gradu- 
ally he  advanced  in  popular  favour ;  many  of  the 
lesser  barons,  jealous  of  the  great  Houses  which 
overshadowed  them,  witnessed  without  displeasure, 
or  were  even  inclined  to  further  the  rise  of  a  new 
power  in  the  State;  and  it  was  long  before  the  pride 
of  the  Colonna  allowed  them  to  see  in  their  unex- 
pected antagonist  anything  but  an  object  of  ridicule 
and  insult.  But  RIenzi's  leaven  worked,  and 
choosing  his  opportunities  with  rare  skill,  he  first 
promulgated  a  set  of  laws  for  the  reform  of  the 
Government,  and  then  persuaded  the  people  to 
assicrn  to  him  the  task  of  enforcingr  them.  Alarmed 
at  last,  but  even  now  unable  to  measure  the  strength 
of  his  despised  opponent,  Stefano  Colonna  hurried 
back  to  Rome.  The  new  ruler  ordered  him  to  quit 
the  city,  and  he  had  not  provided  himself  with  force 
enough  even  to  contest  the  mandate ;  he  had  to 
obey,  and  the  more  prominent  of  the  nobles  either 
accompanied,  or  soon  afterwards  followed  him 
into  banishment.  An  abortive  conspiracy  only 
served  to  increase  Rienzi's  power;  his  enemies  were 
forced  to  swear  allegiance  to  the  new  institutions. 
The  reformer  had  conquered ;  for  the  first  time 
since  the  battle  of  Philippi,  liberty  was  a  word  of 
meaning  in  Rome.  In  the  ecstasy  of  material 
triumph,  Rienzi  was  still  mindful  of  the  greatness  of 
his  ideal ;  invested  with  absolute  power,  he  took 
for  himself  the  title  identified  in  the  history  of  old 
Rome  with  the  championship  of  popular  freedom, 
and    with   consummate    tact    associated   the    Vicar 


ROME   AND    RIENZI  129 

Apostolic  with  himself  in  the  revived  dignity.  The 
two  were  acclaimed  joint  Tribunes  and  Liberators 
of  the  Roman  people. 

The  astonishing  tidings  reached  Avignon  in  the 
early  summer  of  1347;  they  were  soon  confirmed 
by  a  formal  letter  from  Rienzi  himself.  Clement 
and  some  few  members  of  the  Sacred  College  may 
possibly  have  been  statesmen  enough  to  realise  that 
the  Papacy  must  ultimately  succeed  to  any  power 
wrested  from  the  barons.  The  attitude  assumed 
by  the  Vicar  Apostolic  in  Rome,  and  the  fact  that 
Petrarch  seems  never  for  an  instant  to  have  lost 
favour  with  the  Pope,  are  indications  that  the 
Tribune's  success  may  have  been  not  altogether 
unwelcome  in  the  highest  quarters.  But  among 
the  Roman  prelates,  and  especially  in  Cardinal 
Colonna's  household,  the  news  was  received  with 
consternation.  Rienzi  and  all  his  works  were  de- 
nounced with  unmeasured  violence ;  and  only  one 
solitary  voice  was  raised  in  defence  of  the  re- 
former. That  voice  was  Petrarch's.  Immediately 
on  hearing  of  Rienzi's  accession  to  power,  he  wrote 
to  him  and  to  the  Roman  people  a  letter  of  praise, 
encouragement,  and  exhortation,  which  he  knew 
would  be  circulated  through  the  length  and  breadth 
of  Italy  ;  and  he  followed  this  up  with  other  similar 
letters,  with  a  Latin  eclogue,  and  with  the  stately 
Italian  ode  already  mentioned.  To  his  fervid 
imagination,  it  seemed  that  "  the  ancient  strife  was 
being  fought  again,"  that  the  nobles  were  playing 
the  part  of  the  worst  of  the  old  patricians,  and  that 
the  destruction  of  a  power,   the  more  intolerable 


I30     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

because  its  possessors  were  aliens  in  blood,  was  the 
necessary  preliminary  to  a  reign  of  justice. 

Estrangement  from  Cardinal  Colonna  was  the 
inevitable  result  of  Petrarch's  championship  of 
Rienzi ;  it  was  not  in  human  nature  that  a  patron 
should  tolerate  a  client  who  openly  advocated  the 
ruin  of  his  family,  and  it  must  be  confessed  that 
Petrarch  was  not  happy  in  his  manner  of  dealing 
with  the  breach.  The  eclogue  Divortium,  written 
on  the  subject  of  his  parting  with  the  Cardinal, 
though  not  ungraceful,  strikes  the  reader  as  arti- 
ficial even  beyond  the  wont  of  this  kind  of  allegory. 
Moreover,  it  tells  less  than  half  the  truth.  Dislike 
of  Avignon,  longing  for  Italy,  a  desire  for  a  life  of 
independence,  are  all  indicated,  and  these  were 
genuine  motives  as  far  as  they  went.  But  no  hint 
is  given  of  Petrarch's  adhesion  to  Rienzi,  which 
was  the  really  determining  cause  of  the  separation. 
Worse  still  is  the  letter  of  condolence  written  from 
Parma  some  months  after  the  battle  of  November 
20th,  in  which  the  Colonna  family  was  almost 
annihilated.  It  opens,  indeed,  with  a  sincere  and 
touching  acknowledgment  of  the  writer's  debt  to 
the  Cardinal,  but  all  the  rest  is  sorry  reading.  The 
laboured  excuses  for  the  delay  in  writing  it,  and  the 
cold,  stilted  terms  of  its  yet  more  laboured  consola- 
tions, contrasting  so  strikingly  with  the  passionate 
outburst  of  Petrarch's  emotion  when  his  heart  was 
really  wounded,  suggest  an  inevitable  task,  under- 
taken with  reluctance  and  somewhat  ungraciously 
performed.  Undoubtedly  the  very  ardour  of  Pet- 
rarch's patriotism  made  him  appear  more  callous 


ROME   AND    RIENZI  131 

than  he  really  was ;  a  man  of  less  impassioned 
sincerity  would  have  found  it  easier  to  veil  his 
governing  sentiment.  And  two  things  are  very 
noticeable  in  the  history  of  Petrarch's  treatment  of 
the  Colonna  disaster :  first,  that  to  the  end  of  his 
life  he  never  for  an  instant  doubted  the  political 
necessity  of  breaking  their  power  ;  and  secondly, 
that  in  spite  of  this  conviction,  he  never  ceased  to 
speak  of  them,  as  distinguished  from  the  other 
Roman  nobles,  in  terms  of  deep  personal  regard. 
His  relations  with  his  old  friend  and  patron  had 
become  hopeless,  and  for  this  very  reason  he  did 
himself  less  than  justice  in  the  attempt  to  continue 
them. 

Avignon  was  now  more  than  ever  a  place  of 
torment  to  him,  and  even  Vaucluse  lay  too  near  the 
hateful  city  to  be  tolerable  as  a  residence.  He 
resolved  that  he  would  go  to  Italy  and  take  his 
stand  by  the  Tribune's  side.  Rienzi  seemed  more 
firmly  seated  in  power  than  ever ;  the  fame  of  his 
great  enterprise  had  spread  far  and  wide ;  he  had 
formally  announced  his  assumption  of  power  to  the 
sovereign  princes  of  Europe,  and  they  in  return 
had  sent  ambassadors  of  the  highest  rank  to  greet 
and  congratulate  him.  On  the  very  day  when 
Petrarch  set  out  from  Avignon  the  great  slaughter 
of  the  Colonna,  which  left  old  Stefano  the  survivor 
of  all  his  sons  except  the  Cardinal,  and  of  nearly 
all  his  grandsons,  might  have  seemed  to  have  rid 
the  Tribune  of  his  most  dangerous  antagonists. 
But  to  those  who  could  see  beneath  the  surface, 
the    canker    of    decay    was    already    visible.     On 


132      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

November  22nd  Petrarch,  travelling  southward,  met 
a  courier  with  letters  from  Laelius,  which  must  of 
course  have  been  sent  from  Rome  before  the  20th  ; 
these  gave  news  of  Rienzi's  doings  which  caused 
him  the  utmost  alarm.  He  decided  to  suspend 
his  journey  and  await  events  at  Genoa.  Letters 
written  on  the  journey  to  Lselius  and  to  Socrates 
expressed  his  dismay  and  apprehension,  and  on 
the  29th  he  wrote  in  the  strongest  terms  of  anxiety, 
warning,  and  entreaty  to  Rienzi  himself.  "  I  hear," 
he  said,  "  that  you  no  longer  cherish  the  whole 
people,  as  you  used  to  do,  but  only  the  basest 
faction  of  them."  He  implored  Rienzi  not  to  be 
the  destroyer  of  his  own  work,  but  to  stand  firm  on 
the  lofty  ground  which  he  had  taken,  and  to  re- 
member that  great  efforts  are  needed  to  sustain  a 
great  reputation.  Let  him  be  mindful  of  his  duty 
to  be  the  servant  of  the  State,  not  her  tyrant. 

Petrarch's  grief  at  the  impending  ruin  of  his 
country  was  made,  if  possible,  more  poignant  by  his 
sense  of  the  falseness  of  his  own  position.  He  had 
trumpeted  Rienzi  as  the  saviour  of  his  country,  the 
hero  who  had  done  at  a  stroke  the  duty  which  a 
long  line  of  emperors  had  consistently  neglected. 
For  his  sake  he  had  broken  old  friendships,  and 
exposed  himself  to  the  charge  of  callous  ingratitude, 
the  most  odious  accusation  that  could  be  brought 
against  a  man  of  his  temperament.  "  A  most  fright- 
ful storm  of  obloquy,"  he  foresaw,  must  break  upon 
him,  if  Rienzi  faltered  in  the  great  work,  and  with 
denunciation  of  the  turncoat  would  be  mingled 
bitter  ridicule  of  the  dupe.     Petrarch  was  a  self- 


ROME   AND    RIENZI  133 

conscious  man,  whose  vanity  would  embitter  such  a 
trouble,  though  it  would  not  turn  him  from  his 
duty.  The  agony  of  his  anxiety  for  his  country 
and  the  alarm  with  which  he  viewed  his  own  pros- 
pects are  voiced  in  the  despairing  cry  of  his  letter 
to  Laelius :  "I  recognise  my  country's  doom ; 
wherever  I  turn,  I  find  cause  and  matter  for  grief. 
With  Rome  torn  and  wounded,  what  must  be  the 
condition  of  Italy?  With  Italy  maimed,  what  must 
my  life  be  ?  " 

One  ray  of  hope  crossed  his  mind :  Laelius  was  an 
old  and  intimate  friend  of  the  Colonna  ;  might  not 
partisanship  have  led  him  into  exaggeration  of  the 
Tribune's  failings  ?  Alas !  his  tidings  were  only 
too  true.  Rienzi's  head  was  turned  by  the  sudden- 
ness and  completeness  of  his  success.  His  cool 
judgment  gave  place  to  capricious  obstinacy  ;  he 
intrigued  with  the  various  parties  among  his  oppo- 
nents so  clumsily  that  he  united  them  all  against 
him.  He  quarrelled  with  the  Pope's  Vicar,  and 
cited  Pope  and  Emperor  to  his  tribunal ;  at  the 
same  time  his  pretensions  disgusted  the  mob  as 
much  as  his  high  position  excited  their  envy.  Cen- 
turies of  misrule  had  left  the  Roman  people  ill-fitted 
for  self-government ;  patience  could  hardly  be  ex- 
pected of  them.  After  all,  was  not  Rienzi  their 
creature  ?  By  what  title,  then,  could  he  claim  to  be 
their  despot?  It  is  easy  to  tax  the  Roman  people 
with  fickleness;  in  fairness  it  should  be  remembered 
that  they  did  not  desert  Rienzi  till  he  himself  had 
given  unmistakable  signs  that  his  lofty  patriotism 
had  degenerated  into  a  personal  and  rather  tawdry 


134     PETRARCH   AND   HIS  TIMES 

ambition.  He  rose  to  power  as  a  great  idealist,  he 
fell  like  any  faction-mongering  Italian  despot,  and 
his  fall  was  even  more  sudden  than  his  rise.  Hardly 
had  he  celebrated  an  insolent  triumph  over  the 
slaughtered  Colonna,  when  Nemesis  came  upon 
him.  The  mob  rose  against  him  in  tumult,  and  to 
save  his  life  he  had  to  lurk  for  some  days  in  a 
hiding-place  in  the  city,  and  then  flee  in  disguise  to 
Naples.  The  pitiful  meanness  of  the  catastrophe 
embittered  his  friends'  grief  at  the  failure  of  their 
hopes.  "At  least,"  said  Petrarch,  "he  could  have 
died  gloriously  in  the  Capitol  which  he  had  freed." 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE   GREAT   PLAGUE   AND  THE 
DEATH   OF   LAURA 

1348-1349 

THE  condition  of  Italy  in  1348  seemed  desper- 
ate indeed.  For  five  years  the  Great  Com- 
pany, a  body  of  soldier-adventurers  disbanded  by 
the  Pisans  at  the  close  of  a  war  with  Florence,  had 
subjected  her  to  a  war  of  brigandage ;  Naples  lay 
at  the  mercy  of  the  Hungarian  invader ;  Lombardy 
and  the  Emilia  groaned  under  the  misrule  of  un- 
scrupulous tyrants  ;  and  the  only  hopeful  attempt 
ever  made  to  restore  the  liberties  and  reassert  the 
supremacy  of  Rome  had  just  ended  in  ignominious 
failure.  Finally,  as  if  man  had  not  done  enough  to 
devastate  the  "Garden  of  the  Empire,"  she  was 
now  to  suffer  first  a  destructive  earthquake,  and 
then  the  ravages  of  that  appalling  scourge  of  God, 
the  Great  Pestilence.  Boccaccio  in  his  introduction 
to  the  Decameron  has  left  a  description  of  this  awful 
visitation,  which  ranks  among  the  masterpieces  of 
literature.  Perhaps  the  most  striking  impression 
derived  from  reading  it  is  the  feeling  that  com- 
munities and  individuals  alike  lost  their  sense  of 
responsibility ;  that  the  ordinary  rules  of  life  were 
abrogated,  and  the  moral  code  superseded  by  the 

135 


136      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

law  that  each  man  made  for  himself.  Petrarch,  too, 
speaks  in  a  letter  to  Socrates  of  the  unprecedented 
havoc  wrought  by  the  plague:  "of  empty  houses, 
deserted  cities,  the  fields  untilled,  their  space  seem- 
ing narrowed  by  the  strewn  corpses,  everywhere 
the  vastness  of  a  terrible  silence."  He  suffered  his 
full  share  of  the  general  misery  :  blow  after  blow 
fell  upon  him,  crushing  his  spirit  and  crippling  his 
power  of  work ;  for  a  year  and  a  half,  he  declared, 
in  the  letter  just  quoted,  he  could  neither  do  nor  say 
anything  of  worth.  That  is  not  literally  exact :  even 
at  this  season  of  abject  sorrow  he  produced  a  few 
pieces  of  interesting  work,  including  the  poetical 
letter  to  Virgil  written  at  Mantua ;  but  as  compared 
with  any  other  epoch  of  his  life,  the  years  1348  and 
1349  may  be  accounted  a  barren  period.  He  was 
miserable  and  restless.  Parma  was  his  home,  but 
he  could  not  stay  long  at  a  time  even  in  his  "  Cisal- 
pine Helicon."  We  find  him  often  at  Verona,  then 
wandering  from  one  Lombard  city  to  another,  and 
beginning  the  connection  with  Padua,  which  was 
destined  to  become  so  intimate  in  the  near  future. 
At  the  end  of  January,  1348,  he  was  at  Verona; 
on  March  13th  he  returned  to  Parma,  and  brought 
with  him  the  boy  Giovanni,  whose  education  he 
now  entrusted  to  the  grammarian  Ghilberto  Baiani. 
Giovanni  probably  lived  at  home,  attending  Ghil- 
berto's  school  as  a  day-boy,  and  father  and  son  were 
both  the  unhappier  for  an  association  which  should 
have  brought  solace  to  the  one  and  a  new  interest 
in  life  to  both. 

The  first  bereavement  of  which  Petrarch  received 


I.AUKA 

FKO.M    A    I'KI.N'T    IN     IHE    I'ADUAN    1819    EIJllION    OF   THE   CANZONIEKE 


THE    GREAT    PLAGUE  137 

certain  tidings  in  this  year  of  mourning  was  the 
death  of  his  cousin  and  friend,  Francesco  degli 
Albizzi,  a  sorrow  which  he  felt  the  more  acutely  as 
Francesco  was  struck  down  while  on  his  way  to  pay 
him  an  eagerly  expected  visit.  But  already,  if  we 
may  treat  the  uncorroborated  evidence  of  passages 
in  his  Italian  poems  as  sufficient  authority  for  a 
fact,  he  had  felt  the  presage  of  a  far  heavier  loss, 
which  must  change  the  face  of  the  world  for  him 
henceforward.  On  April  6th,  the  twenty-first  anni- 
versary of  his  first  meeting  with  Laura,  while 
resident  at  Verona,  he  felt  a  sudden  presentiment 
of  her  death,  and  on  May  19th  a  letter  from 
Socrates  reached  him  at  Parma  telling  him  that  she 
had  indeed  died  at  the  very  moment  of  the  mysteri- 
ous warning.  The  fly-leaf  of  his  Virgil  contains 
this  entry  : — 

"Laura,  a  shining  example  of  virtue  in  herself,  and 
for  many  years  made  known  to  fame  by  my  poems, 
first  came  visibly  before  my  eyes  in  the  season 
of  my  early  youth,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1327, 
on  the  6th  day  of  the  month  of  April,  in  the  Church 
of  St.  Clara  of  Avignon,  in  the  morning.  And  in  the 
same  city,  on  the  same  6th  day  of  the  same  month 
of  April,  at  the  same  hour  of  Prime,  but  in  the  year 
1348,  the  bright  light  of  her  life  was  taken  away 
from  the  light  of  this  earth,  when  I  chanced  to  be 
dwelling  at  Verona  in  unhappy  ignorance  of  my 
doom.  The  sorrowful  report  came  to  me,  however, 
in  a  letter  from  my  Lewis,  which  reached  me  at 
Parma  on  the  morning  of  the  19th  day  of  May  in  the 
same  year.     Her  most  chaste  and  most  beautiful 


138     PETRARCH    AND    HIS  TIMES 

body  was  laid  to  rest  in  the  habitation  of  the  Minor 
Friars  at  evening-  on  the  very  day  of  her  death. 
Her  soul,  I  am  persuaded,  has  returned,  in  the 
words  that  Seneca  uses  of  Africanus,  to  the  heaven 
which  was  its  home.  I  have  thought  good  to  write 
this  note,  with  a  kind  of  bitter  sweetness,  as  a 
painful  reminder  of  my  sorrow,  and  have  chosen 
this  place  for  it,  as  one  which  comes  constantly 
under  my  eyes,  reckoning  as  I  do  that  there  ought 
to  be  nothing  to  give  me  further  pleasure  in  this 
life,  and  that  by  frequent  looking  on  these  words 
and  by  computing  the  swiftness  of  life's  flight  I  may 
be  admonished  that  now,  with  the  breaking  of  my 
strongest  chain,  it  is  time  to  flee  out  of  Babylon. 
And  this  by  the  prevention  of  God's  grace  will  be 
easy  for  me,  when  I  consider  with  insight  and 
resolution  my  past  life's  idle  cares,  the  emptiness  of 
its  hopes,  and  its  extraordinary  issues." 

The  death  of  Laura  removed  an  element  of  storm 
and  stress  from  Petrarch's  life  ;  at  the  cost  of  a 
great  sorrow  it  gave  him  final  deliverance  from 
passion.  Years  afterwards,  when  he  sat  down  to 
write  in  all  candour  the  autobiographical  fragment 
which  he  called  his  Letter  to  Posterity,  he  could 
even  speak  of  his  bereavement  as  "timely  for  him, 
in  spite  of  its  bitterness."  That  was  the  calm  judg- 
ment of  retrospect ;  it  is  the  note  in  the  Virgil 
which  expresses  his  feeling  at  the  time,  and  helps 
us  to  realise  the  deep  sincerity  underlying  the 
elaborate  art  of  his  poems  On  the  Death  of  Madonna 
Laura.  In  poetical  quality  the  second  part  of  the 
Canzoniere  does  not  differ  from  the  first ;  there  is 


THE   GREAT    PLAGUE  139 

the  same  faultless  workmanship,  the  same  delicate 
play  of  fancy,  the  same  felicitous  rendering  of  the 
subtlest  shades  of  emotion.  To  take  only  a  single 
illustration,  the  sonnet  to  the  bird  that  sang  in 
winter  may  rank  with  the  sonnet  to  the  waters  of 
the  Sorgue  as  a  lyric  born  of  the  poet's  sympathy 
with  nature.  But  in  sentiment  the  poems  of  the 
second  part  differ  widely  from  their  predecessors  ; 
their  prevailing  tone  is  exactly  that  "  bitter  sweet- 
ness "  of  which  the  note  in  the  Virgil  speaks,  and 
they  are  permeated  by  a  spirit  of  piety,  which 
reminds  us  of  Petrarch's  saying  in  the  Secretum 
that  "  through  love  of  Laura  he  attained  to  love 
of  God." 

The  composition  of  these  poems  extended  over 
more  than  a  decade,  and  we  cannot  assign  dates  to 
them  with  even  an  approach  to  exactitude.  Criti- 
cism which  relies  entirely  on  appreciation  of  spirit 
and  tone  is  always  risky,  for  it  gives  undue  scope 
to  the  temperament  of  the  critic ;  and  it  is  doubly 
dangerous  in  dealing  with  Petrarch,  who  was  for 
ever  correcting  and  polishing  his  works,  and  whose 
faculty  of  reminiscence  was  so  acute  that  it  could 
carry  him  back  almost  at  will  into  the  temper  of  a 
period  that  had  long  passed  away.  Neither  can  we 
trust  the  position  of  any  given  poem  in  the  collec- 
tion as  a  proof  of  its  place  in  the  order  of  composi- 
tion ;  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  in  the  final 
arrangement  of  the  Canzoniere  Petrarch  was  guided 
chiefly  by  his  sense  of  artistic  fitness.  Still  it  is 
reasonable  to  suppose  that  many  of  the  lyrics  were 
the  immediate  fruit  of  his  sorrow,  and  that,  speak- 


HO     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

ing  generally,   the  earlier  in  place   were  also  the 
earlier  in  time  ;  it  is  difficult,  for  instance,  to  believe 
that  at  least  the  inspiration  of  the  ode  Che  debb'  to 
far  was  not  due  to  the  poignancy  of  recent  grief. 

All  through  the  summer  the  plague  infested 
Avignon,  and  on  July  3rd  Cardinal  Colon na  fell  a 
victim  to  it.  Stefano  the  Elder  had  now  outlived 
all  his  seven  sons.  However  great  was  the  strain 
put  upon  their  relations  by  recent  events,  Petrarch 
had  till  a  year  ago  been  like  a  son  of  the  House, 
and  even  in  the  pain  of  parting  he  had  not  for  a 
moment  forgotten  or  concealed  his  debt  of  affection- 
ate gratitude  to  his  patron.  He  could  not  avoid 
writing  to  old  Stefano,  and  he  accomplished  the 
task  of  condolence  much  better  now  than  in  the 
previous  autumn.  It  was  not  an  easy  letter  to 
write  ;  he  could  not  pour  out  his  soul,  and  he  would 
not  be  guilty  of  an  insincerity.  He  solved  the 
difficulty  in  a  way  characteristic  of  him  and  of  his 
age,  by  composing  with  extreme  care  an  elaborate 
epistle  graced  with  rich  ornaments  of  classical 
learnincr.  Nothino-  could  be  more  foreign  to  the 
sentiments  of  our  own  day  ;  but  it  was  what  a  past 
generation  would  have  called  "a  beautiful  letter," 
and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  its  recipient  would 
take  as  a  compliment  the  pains  bestowed  on 
its  composition.  Throughout  its  length  Petrarch 
keeps  his  emotion  under  restraint ;  but  its  formality 
is  rather  grave  than  cold,  and  in  one  passage,  which 
speaks  of  Giovanni  as  having  attained  to  the 
cardinalate  and  of  Giacomo  as  having  been  surely 
destined  to  rise  even  higher  had  life  been  granted 


THE   GREAT    PLAGUE  141 

to  him,  the  sincerity  of  the  emotion  is  almost 
intensified  by  the  restraint  put  upon  its  expression. 

If  grief  could  have  been  assuaged  by  pubHc 
honours,  Petrarch  would  have  found  no  lack  of 
consolation.  The  "  storm  of  obloquy "  which  he 
anticipated  from  his  association  with  Rienzi  never 
burst.  On  the  contrary,  hardly  a  month  passed 
without  his  receiving;'  some  signal  mark  of  esteem 
from  persons  high  in  place  and  power.  Whatever 
the  rulers  of  Italy  might  think  of  Rienzi's  abortive 
political  Renaissance,  they  vied  with  each  other  in 
doing  honour  to  Petrarch  as  the  leader  of  its  intel- 
lectual counterpart.  Humanism  was  now  in  the 
air,  and  the  sure  instinct  which  guides  men  swayed 
by  a  general  impulse  pointed  to  Petrarch  as  its 
prophet.  Heedless  of  political  differences,  the  rulers 
of  Ferrara,  of  Carpi,  of  Mantua,  and  of  Padua  were 
at  one  in  welcoming  him  to  their  cities,  and  that 
the  Pope  regarded  him  with  undiminished  favour  was 
testified  by  his  presentation  in  1348  or  1349  to  the 
archdeaconry  of  Parma,  of  which  he  took  formal 
possession  in  1350. 

Of  these  new  connections  by  far  the  most  im- 
portant was  his  friendship  with  Jacopo  II  da  Car- 
rara, the  ruler  of  Padua.  History  affords  no  more 
typical  example  of  an  Italian  despot  than  this 
remarkable  man,  who  obtained  his  lordship  by 
murder  and  forgery,  and  used  it  to  promote  the 
welfare  of  his  city  and  the  interests  of  art  and  learn- 
ing. Better,  perhaps,  than  any  of  his  contemporaries 
he  appreciated  the  value  of  Petrarch's  work,  and 
this  just  estimate  made  him,  if  possible,  more  eager 


142      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

than  the  others  to  do  honour  to  the  poet  and  to 
enjoy  the  luxury  of  his  companionship.  It  was  in 
1 345  that  he  seized  the  government  of  Padua ; 
over  and  over  again  in  the  next  few  years  he  sent 
letters  and  messages  entreating  Petrarch  to  come 
and  live  with  him  there;  at  last,  in  March,  1349, 
Petrarch  paid  him  a  visit  and  was  received,  "  not 
like  a  man,  but  with  such  a  welcome  as  awaits  the 
souls  who  enter  Paradise."  To  ensure  his  new 
friend's  future  residence  in  Padua,  Jacopo  procured 
him  a  canonry  there,  to  which  he  was  formally 
inducted  on  the  Saturday  after  Easter.  Loaded 
thus  with  honours  and  benefits,  Petrarch  may  be 
forgiven  if  he  ignored  Jacopo's  crimes,  which  he 
had  not  personally  witnessed,  and  celebrated  in 
terms  of  unstinted  eulogy  his  friend's  virtues  and 
charm,  of  which  he  had  daily  experience  in  the 
intimacy  of  private  life.  Jacopo  was  evidently  a 
man  as  fascinating  to  his  friends  as  he  was  danger- 
ous to  his  enemies.  When  he  set  himself  to  win 
Petrarch's  love  and  gratitude,  he  succeeded  so  com- 
pletely that  the  latter  could  write  to  Luca  Cristiano, 
to  whom  he  would  certainly  not  be  guilty  of  an 
insincerity,  "  I  have  another  residence  equally  tran- 
quil, equally  fit  to  be  our  joint  home,  at  Padua,  in 
the  valley  of  the  Po,  where  no  small  portion  of  our 
happiness  would  consist  in  the  privilege  of  living 
with  my  benefactor  whose  qualities  I  have  so 
extolled  to  you." 

This  letter  was  written  to  Luca  on  May  i8th, 
very  soon  after  Petrarch's  return  to  Parma,  where 
he  found  that,  as  he  prettily  says,  "  the  one  draw- 


THE    GREAT    PLAGUE  143 

back  to  his  stay  in  Padua  had  been  that  he  had 
thereby  missed  a  visit  from  Luca  and  Mainardo," 
Bitterly  indeed  did  he  regret  his  absence  when 
some  weeks  later  he  learnt  that  it  had  lost  him  his 
last  opportunity  of  seeing  that  loyal  soldier  and  true 
friend  alive.  Finding  him  away  from  home,  the 
two  had  supped  in  his  house  and  slept  together 
in  his  bed.  The  next  morning  they  left  a  letter 
telling  him  that  they  had  just  come  from  Avignon 
after  saying  good-bye  to  Socrates,  and  were  on 
their  way,  Mainardo  to  Florence  and  Luca  to  Rome, 
but  that  a  little  later  on  they  hoped  to  come  back 
and  stay  with  him  in  Parma.  Finding  this  letter  on 
his  return  more  than  a  month  afterwards,  Petrarch 
began  to  wonder  why  he  heard  no  further  tidings 
of  them,  and  presently  dispatched  a  confidential 
servant  to  Florence  with  a  letter  to  Mainardo,  and 
a  request  that  he  would  send  the  servant  on  to 
Luca.  Eight  days  later  the  messenger  reappeared 
with  the  lamentable  news  that,  as  the  friends  were 
crossing  the  Apennines,  they  had  been  ambushed 
by  armed  banditti ;  that  Mainardo,  who  was  riding 
ahead,  had  been  instantly  slain,  and  Luca,  who 
dashed  to  his  assistance,  had  at  length  escaped,  no 
one  knew  whither,  so  severely  wounded  that  it  was 
feared  he  must  have  died.  Perils  of  this  kind 
were  common  enough  in  the  Italy  of  the  fourteenth 
century ;  Petrarch  himself,  as  we  have  seen,  had 
had  more  than  one  narrow  escape  from  a  similar 
fate.  But  his  wrathful  indignation  knew  no  bounds 
when  he  heard  that  these  banditti  were  under  the 
protection  of  certain  great  men  of  the  neighbour- 


144      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

hood  "unworthy  of  the  name  of  nobles,"  who 
prevented  the  peasants  from  coming  to  Luca's  help 
and  avenofinor  Mainardo's  death,  and  grave  the 
robbers  shelter  in  their  fortresses.  Petrarch  was 
for  some  time  in  doubt  about  Luca's  fate.  He 
made  fruitless  inquiries  at  Florence,  at  Piacenza, 
and  in  Rome  ;  at  length  a  member  of  his  household 
happened  to  meet  a  Florentine  of  position  passing 
through  Parma,  and,  knowing  his  master's  anxiety, 
made  bold  to  entreat  the  stranger  to  see  Petrarch 
and  tell  him  all  he  knew.  From  this  stranger 
Petrarch  heard  to  his  great  comfort  that  Luca  was 
still  alive,  but  the  melancholy  story  of  Mainardo's 
death  was  confirmed  in  every  particular. 

Many  other  friends  died  in  these  terrible  years  of 
plague,  among  them  one  whose  loss  caused  Petrarch 
the  keenest  grief,  though  their  friendship  was  of 
recent  origin.  Paganino  Bizozero  was  a  native  of 
the  Milanese  territory  whom  Luchino  Visconti  had 
appointed  Governor  of  Parma.  Here  Petrarch 
found  him  at  the  end  of  1347,  and  here  appar- 
ently he  died  on  May  23rd,  1349,  though  his 
governorship  had  come  to  an  end  four  months 
before.  Their  intimacy,  therefore,  lasted  less  than 
a  year  and  a  half,  but  Petrarch's  account  of  him, 
given  in  the  same  letter  to  Socrates  which  tells  of 
Mainardo's  death,  shows  how  close  a  bond  of  affec- 
tion united  them  during  that  short  period.  "  There 
was  left  to  me,"  he  says,  "a  friend  of  illustrious 
dignity,  a  high-minded  and  very  prudent  man, 
Paganino  of  Milan,  who  by  many  instances  of  his 
worth    had    become   most   congenial    to    me,    and 


THE    GREAT    PLAGUE  145 

seemed  altogether  worthy  not  of  my  love  only,  but 
of  yours  too.  So  he  had  begun  to  be  as  a  second 
Socrates  to  me  ;  there  was  almost  the  same  confi- 
dence, almost  the  same  intimacy,  as  well  as  that 
sweetest  property  of  friendship,  the  sharing  of  either 
kind  of  fortune  and  the  opening  of  the  soul's  hiding- 
places  for  the  loyal  communication  of  its  secret 
things.  Oh,  how  he  loved  you ;  how  eagerly  he 
desired  to  see  you  whom  indeed  he  did  see  with  his 
spiritual  eyes ;  how  anxious  he  was  for  your  life  in 
this  general  shipwreck !  so  that  even  I  marvelled 
that  a  man  not  personally  known  could  be  so  well 
beloved.  If  ever  he  saw  me  sadder  than  my  wont, 
he  would  ask  in  friendly  trepidation,  What  is  the 
matter  ?  What  news  of  our  friend  ?  And  when 
he  had  been  told  that  you  were  well,  he  would  put 
away  his  fear  and  overflow  with  exceeding  joyful- 
ness.  Now  he,  as  I  must  tell  you  with  many  tears 
.  .  .  was  suddenly  seized  one  evening  with  this 
sickness  of  the  plague  which  is  now  destroying  the 
world.  He  had  taken  supper  with  his  friends,  and 
had  spent  the  rest  of  that  evening  entirely  in  talking 
about  us  and  discoursing  of  our  friendship  and  our 
affairs.  That  night  he  spent  in  enduring  extreme 
agony  with  perfect  fearlessness ;  in  the  morning 
death  quickly  carried  him  off;  and,  the  plague 
abating  no  jot  of  its  usual  cruelty,  before  three  days 
were  past  his  sons  and  every  member  of  his  house- 
hold had  followed  him  to  the  grave," 


CHAPTER    IX 

FLORENCE   AND   BOCCACCIO 
1350 

PETRARCH'S  life  may  be  divided  into  three 
clearly  defined  periods,  of  which  the  boundary 
marks  are  dates  in  the  history  of  his  friendships. 
The  first  period  ends  with  the  great  plague,  and 
the  deaths  of  Laura  and  Mainardo ;  the  second 
opens  with  his  visit  to  Boccaccio,  and  closes  with 
the  second  plague  and  the  deaths  of  Socrates, 
Lselius,  Nelli,  and  Barbato;  the  third  is  the  last 
period  of  the  poet's  life,  when  of  his  earlier  friends 
only  Guido  Settimo  and  Philip  de  Cabassoles  re- 
mained alive,  but  his  old  age  was  saved  from 
desolation  by  the  ever-strengthening  tie  of  affection 
which  bound  him  to  Boccaccio,  by  the  veneration  of 
his  pupils,  and  by  the  devoted  love  of  his  daughter. 
The  last  years  of  the  first  period,  while  afflicting 
him  with  heavy  sorrows,  had  brought  him  a  great 
accession  of  material  wealth :  he  now  held  a  priory, 
three  canonries,  and  an  archdeaconry,  to  the  latter 
of  which  was  attached  a  large  official  house,  of 
which  he  made  occasional  use,  while  retaining  for 
ordinary  purposes  the  more  modest  residence, 
which  he  had  bought  and  beautified.  His  personal 
expenses,  apart  from  the  cost  of  travel,  cannot  have 

146 


FLORENCE   AND    BOCCACCIO     147 

been  large,  for  wherever  he  went  he  found  welcome 
and  entertainment.  His  income,  then,  was  more 
than  sufficient  to  supply  his  personal  needs,  and 
to  allow  him  to  make  provision  for  his  son  and 
daughter.  Characteristically,  he  spent  the  surplus 
in  furthering  his  life's  work.  From  this  time  for- 
ward,  he  was  hardly  ever  without  a  copyist  or  two 
in  the  house — sometimes  he  had  as  many  as  four 
at  once — engaged  in  making  transcripts  from  the 
precious  manuscripts,  which  he  had  either  hunted 
out  himself,  or  borrowed  from  friends,  with  a 
view  to  their  reproduction.  He  still  did  much  of 
this  work  himself,  and  more  than  once  we  find  him 
complaining,  not  that  good  copyists  were  dear,  but 
that  they  were  scarce.  We  shall  never  know  with 
certainty  how  much  we  owe  to  this  employment  of 
his  money,  but  we  may  safely  assume  that  if  he  had 
remained  poor,  many  a  library  would  be  without 
some  of  its  richest  treasures.  Even  as  things  were, 
his  industry  and  Boccaccio's  were  taxed  to  the 
utmost  limit  of  human  capacity. 

He  divided  the  earlier  months  of  1350  between 
Padua,  Parma,  and  Verona ;  on  Valentine's  Day  he 
was  present  at  the  solemn  translation  of  the  body 
of  St.  Anthony  of  Padua  from  its  first  place  of 
burial  to  the  church  newly  erected  in  the  saint's 
honour.  A  document  discovered  by  Fracassetti 
fixes  June  20th  as  the  day  on  which  he  took  formal 
possession  of  his  archdeaconry  ;  immediately  after- 
wards he  must  have  left  Parma  for  a  fiying  visit  to 
Mantua,  for  it  was  on  his  way  back  from  that  city 
that  some  members  of  the  Gonzaga  family  enter- 


148     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

tained  him  on  June  28th  to  a  sumptuous  supper 
in  their  castle  of  Luzzera,  which  Petrarch  describes 
in  a  humorous  letter  to  LaeHus  as  "a  home  of  flies 
and  fleas  enHvened  by  the  croaking  of  an  army  of 
frogs." 

Meanwhile  the  year  of  Jubilee  was  being  cele- 
brated in  Rome,  with  the  more  solemnity  as  the 
terrors  of  the  plague  had  inclined  the  minds  of 
many  to  religion,  and  disposed  them  to  obtain  the 
indulgences  promised  to  those  who  went  on  pilgrim- 
age to  Rome.  Petrarch  tried  unsuccessfully  to 
persuade  Gulielmo  da  Pastrengo  to  accompany  him 
thither.  Failing  in  this,  he  set  out  alone,  about 
the  beginning  of  October.  He  travelled  by  way  of 
Florence,  a  journey  ever  memorable  as  the  occasion 
of  his  first  meeting  with  Boccaccio. 

History  contains  no  more  satisfactory  episode 
than  the  friendship  of  these  two  men  of  letters. 
From  their  society  their  companions  must  have 
derived  the  same  kind  of  pleasure  that  the  eye 
finds  in  looking  at  a  harmonious  arrangement  of 
complementary  colours.  Their  natures  were  made 
to  supplement  each  other ;  the  life  of  neither  could 
be  reckoned  complete  till  he  had  found  his  fellow. 
Petrarch  had  an  anxious  spirit ;  under  every  rose 
he  looked  for  the  thorn,  and  if  he  failed  to  find  it, 
he  vexed  his  soul  with  questioning  whether  it  ought 
not  to  have  pricked  him.  Boccaccio  plucked  the 
flower  and  wore  it  with  a  gay  assurance  that  took 
no  count  of  thorn-pricks.  Petrarch's  worst  troubles 
were  the  offspring  of  his  own  soul ;  Boccaccio's 
were  imposed  on  him  by  the  rub  of  circumstance. 


UOCCACCIO 

FROM    A   I'OKTKAIT    IN   THE    BRITISH    MUSKUM 


FLORENCE   AND    BOCCACCIO     149 

Petrarch  was  introspective,  self-conscious,  jealous  to 
a  fault  of  his  reputation,  but  laudably  anxious  to 
deserve  it.  Boccaccio  was  too  well  amused  by  the 
follies  of  others  to  be  deeply  concerned  about  his 
own,  and  too  instinctively  an  artist  to  care  over- 
much what  other  people  thought  of  his  art.  Pet- 
rarch had  the  deeper  nature,  the  higher  ideals,  the 
more  sensitive  conscience ;  in  Boccaccio  we  are 
captivated  by  a  rich  generosity  of  sympathetic 
humour.  In  intellect  no  less  than  in  character  each 
of  them  was  his  friend's  complement.  They  were 
alike  in  their  enthusiasm  for  learning  and  in  their 
indefatigable  industry,  but  they  were  alike  in  hardly 
anything  else.  Petrarch  was  incomparably  the  riper 
scholar,  the  sounder  critic  ;  he  had  a  more  reasoned 
judgment,  a  more  cultivated  taste ;  Boccaccio  had 
the  more  fertile  imagination,  the  brighter  wit. 
Petrarch  was  lucid  in  argument,  but  apt  to  be  prolix 
in  narrative  ;  Boccaccio  showed  little  talent  for  dis- 
quisition, but  his  was  the  story-teller's  inimitable 
gift. 

There  is  therefore  a  quality  in  Petrarch's  inter- 
course with  Boccaccio  which  distinguishes  it  from 
all  his  other  friendships.  Close  and  intimate  as  it 
was,  there  were  others  which  for  some  years  to 
come  surpassed  it  in  intensity  of  feeling ;  Boccaccio 
was  very  dear,  but  Socrates,  Lselius,  and  Francesco 
Nelli,  of  whom  we  shall  have  to  speak  immediately, 
were  dearer  still.  All  these,  however,  were  Pet- 
rarch's followers  in  the  battle  for  culture  ;  Boccaccio 
stood  by  his  side,  a  comrade-in-arms.  True,  that 
with    unfailing    reverence    he    styled    himself    his 


I50     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

pupil,  and  that  the  title  was  accurate  as  well  as 
modest.  Petrarch  possessed,  in  a  degree  rare  even 
among  great  leaders,  the  divine  gift  of  kindling 
enthusiasm,  and  Boccaccio's  glowing  tributes  may 
express  without  exaggeration  the  magnitude  of  his 
debt ;  none  the  less,  he  stands  out  above  the  rest, 
his  master's  sole  intellectual  peer. 

In  Boccaccio's  house  Petrarch  found  another 
Florentine,  with  whom  he  fell  at  once  into  a  friend- 
ship that  reminds  us  of  Lombez  and  the  earlier 
days  at  Avignon.  Francesco  di  Nello  Rinucci, 
commonly  called  Francesco  Nelli,  came  of  an  in- 
fluential family ;  his  father  had  held  the  office  of 
Gonfalonier  of  Justice,  the  highest  executive  dignity 
in  the  republic.  He  was  himself  in  Orders,  and 
Prior  of  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Apostles,  but  had 
some  talent  for  affairs,  for  which  he  found  scope 
later  in  the  post  of  Secretary  to  the  Grand 
Seneschal  of  Naples ;  at  home  Petrarch  seems  to 
have  thought  that  his  abilities  were  insufficiently 
appreciated,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  was  a  most 
loyal  patriot.  He  was  an  intimate  friend  of  Boccaccio, 
and  an  enthusiast  for  learning.  He  took  his  place 
at  once  in  the  inmost  circle  of  Petrarch's  friends, 
and  the  latter,  with  his  familiar  habit  of  bestowing 
gracious  nicknames,  called  him  his  Simonides. 

Here,  too,  Petrarch  met  the  eminent  scholar  and 
lawyer  Jacopo  or  Lapo  da  Castiglionchio,  of  whose 
accomplishments  Coluccio  Salutati,  himself  a  dis- 
tinguished follower  of  Petrarch  in  humanistic  studies, 
could  write  after  his  death  :  "Whom  has  our  State 
ever   produced   more    diligent    in    pursuit    of   our 


FLORENCE   AND    BOCCACCIO     151 

studies  and  of  those  which  pertain  to  eloquence  ? 
Which  of  the  poets  was  unknown  to  him,  nay, 
rather,  which  of  them  was  not  a  hackneyed  writer 
to  him  ?  Who  was  better  versed  in  the  works  of 
Cicero  ?  Who  more  abundant  in  gleanings  from 
history  ?  Who  more  deeply  imbued  with  the  pre- 
cepts of  moral  philosophy  ?  Good  heavens  !  How 
he  abounded  in  sweetness,  and  in  weightiness  of 
discourse ;  how  ready  he  was  in  dictation,  or  in 
settinor  himself  to  the  task  of  writinor  I  " 

With  all  these  three  men  Petrarch  had  already 
been  in  communication  by  letter.  Lapo  had  sent 
him  Cicero's  Pro  Milone  the  year  before,  and 
thenceforward  the  two  kept  up  a  constant  commerce 
of  books.  In  addition  to  the  Pro  Milone^  Lapo 
sent  him  at  different  times  the  Pro  Plancio  and  the 
Philippics,  of  which  Petrarch  had  copies  made  by 
trustworthy  scribes  before  sending  them  back  ;  and 
in  return  he  communicated  to  Lapo  his  own  precious 
discovery,  the  Pro  A  re  hid.  Lapo  was  a  fervent 
admirer  of  Petrarch's  genius,  and  possessed  a  manu- 
script of  the  last  thirteen  books  of  his  Familiar 
Letters,  which  is  now  preserved  in  the  Laurentian 
Library  at  Florence.  It  contains  some  interesting 
marginal  notes  in  Lapo's  own  handwriting. 

How  long  Petrarch  had  been  in  communication 
with  Boccaccio  and  Nelli  is  not  quite  certain.  If 
one  of  his  letters  to  Socrates  is  rightly  ascribed  to 
the  year  1350,  he  was  already  on  terms  of  affection- 
ate intimacy  with  them  both  ;  and  this  is  confirmed 
by  Boccaccio's  statement  that  he  was  devoted  to 
Petrarch   for  forty  years  or   more.     This   passage 


152     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

has  led  to  a  conjecture  that  the  two  may  have  met 
in  Paris,  while  others  have  dated  their  intimacy 
from  Petrarch's  first  visit  to  Naples;  but  Boccaccio's 
words  do  not  necessarily  imply  more  than  devoted 
admiration,  and  Petrarch's  own  statement  that  Boc- 
caccio had  not  previously  known  him  by  sight  is  a 
conclusive  reason  for  assigning  the  year  1350  as  the 
date  of  their  first  meeting  face  to  face.     We  must 

o 

suppose,  then,  either  that  the  sentence  in  the  letter 
to  Socrates  is  a  later  interpolation,  or  that  the 
earlier  intimacy  had  been  one  of  letters  which  have 
not  come  down  to  us.  The  first  extant  communica- 
tion is  a  copy  of  verses  sent  by  Petrarch  to 
Boccaccio  in  1349. 

This  first  visit  was  a  very  short  one ;  Petrarch 
hastened  on  to  Rome,  but  on  October  15th  he  was 
delayed  at  Bolsena  by  an  injury  to  the  thigh  caused 
by  a  kick  from  his  horse.  In  spite  of  this  mishap, 
he  was  in  Rome  by  November  ist,  but  his  wound 
still  gave  him  much  pain.  In  December  he  left 
Rome  for  his  birthplace,  Arezzo,  whose  citizens 
received  him  with  extraordinary  honour.  Thence 
he  went  on  to  Florence  for  a  second  and  probably 
longer  visit  to  Boccaccio ;  and  it  was  here,  not  at 
Arezzo  as  Fracassetti  states,  that  Lapo  gave  him 
a  copy  of  the  newly  discovered  Institutions  of 
Quintilian.  As  was  his  wont,  Petrarch  eagerly 
devoured  the  new  treasure,  and  then  sat  down  to 
an  appreciation  of  it  in  the  form  of  a  letter  to  its 
dead  author. 

He  left  Florence  about  the  new  year,  and  three 
months  later  he  received  a  return  visit  from  Boc- 


FLORENCE    AND    BOCCACCIO     153 

caccio,  of  which  the  occasion  must  have  been  singu- 
larly gratifying  to  both.  Technically  Petrarch  was 
still  a  banished  man ;  the  decree  which  exiled 
Petracco  two  years  before  his  son's  birth  applied  to 
his  descendants,  and  Petrarch  was  theoretically  in 
peril  of  his  life  when  in  his  forty-seventh  year  he 
visited  the  city  of  his  ancestors.  Practically  there 
was  no  fear  of  any  attack  on  him.  Florence  was 
eaofer  to  claim  her  share  in  the  distinction  achieved 
by  her  illustrious  son.  But  for  very  shame  she 
could  not  speak  of  Petrarch  as  a  Florentine  while 
her  own  records  proclaimed  him  an  exile.  Pet- 
rarch's visits  to  Florence  gave  an  appropriate 
opportunity  of  redressing  the  wrong  done  to  him 
through  his  father,  and  his  friendship  with  Boccaccio 
enabled  the  reparation  to  be  made  in  a  singularly 
agreeable  manner.  At  the  beginning  of  April 
Boccaccio  went  to  Padua  as  the  bearer  of  a  letter 
from  the  Priors  of  the  Guilds  and  the  Gonfalonier 
of  Justice  of  the  People  and  State  of  Florence,  re- 
voking the  sentence  of  banishment,  restoring  the 
property  confiscated  nearly  fifty  years  before,  and 
inviting  Petrarch  in  terms  of  honorific  compli- 
ment to  fix  his  abode  in  the  city  of  his  forefathers. 
Petrarch  replied  in  cordial  and  dignified  terms.  It 
is  noticeable  that  even  as  an  exile  he  had  always 
spoken  of  Florence  as  his  "  Patria,"  and  he  must 
now  have  felt  a  new  pleasure  in  acknowledging  his 
Tuscan  descent.  For  a  time  he  may  even  have 
thought  seriously  of  accepting  the  invitation  to  go 
and  live  amon^  those  who  now  addressed  him  as 
"fellow-citizen." 


154     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

However  this  may  be,  Padua  had  for  the  moment 
lost  its  charm,  and  had  become  a  place  of  mourning 
for  him.  He  had  returned  there  on  January  7th,  to 
find  that  a  fortnight  earlier  Jacopo  da  Carrara  had 
been  assassinated  by  a  bastard  nephew.  Petrarch's 
grief  was  profound.  His  lamentations,  loud  and 
bitter  as  they  are,  have  no  note  of  exaggeration  ; 
his  praises  of  his  dead  friend,  though  pitched  in  the 
highest  key,  are  absolutely  sincere.  Jacopo's  death 
must  have  made  him  not  unwilling  to  leave  Italy 
for  a  time,  when  in  the  summer  of  1351  it  became 
convenient  for  him  to  return  to  Vaucluse. 


THR    TOMH  Ol'"   JACOI'O   II.    DA  (  ARKAKA,   \V1  TH    I  NSCKI  I'l  I(  )N    \:\    I'KIR  ARCH 


CHAPTER    X 

VAUCLUSE 
1351-1353 

ON  May  3rd  he  left  Padua,  accompanied  by  the 
boy  Giovanni,  after  dictating  an  impromptu 
epitaph  for  Jacopo's  tomb,  on  which  he  might  profit- 
ably have  spent  a  little  more  time.  The  genuine- 
ness of  its  sentiment  makes  inadequate  amends  for 
the  extreme  flatness  of  its  composition.  Petrarch 
had  the  pen  of  a  ready  writer,  but  the  fluency  of  his 
poetic  style  always  needed  the  correction  of  his 
maturer  judgment. 

That  night  he  stayed  at  Vicenza,  and  found  there, 
to  his  amusement  and  delight,  an  old  man  more 
enthusiastic  about  Cicero  than  himself,  or  at  least 
more  intemperate  in  praise  of  him.  The  talk  of 
the  company  after  supper  fell  upon  the  great  Latin 
author,  the  old  man  abounding  in  unqualified  admira- 
tion of  him.  Here  was  Petrarch's  pet  subject 
brought  ready  to  his  hand ;  he  put  forward  his 
favourite  view  that  Cicero  was  flawless  as  a  writer 
and  an  orator,  but  somewhat  unstable  as  a  politician, 
and  he  gave  the  audience  the  rare  privilege  of 
hearing  him  read  his  own  two  letters  to  Cicero, 
which  are  written  upon  this  theme.  But  the  old 
man    was  unconvinced ;    he    threw   out  his    hands 

155 


156      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

piteously,  crying,  "  Spare,  oh  spare  my  Cicero  ! " 
And  when  pressed  by  arguments  that  he  could  not 
answer,  shut  his  eyes  and  turned  away  his  head  as 
if  in  pain,  moaning,  "  Ah  me  !  Ah  me  !  So  they  are 
finding  fault  with  my  Cicero !  " 

Petrarch  stayed  some  days  at  Verona,  and  then 
went  on  to  Piacenza,  whence,  on  June  nth,  he 
dispatched  a  letter  to  Socrates,  written  some  weeks 
earlier,  but  held  back  for  want  of  a  trusty  mes- 
senger. To  this  he  added  a  few  sentences  announc- 
ing that  he  was  on  his  way  to  Vaucluse,  and  hoped 
that  Socrates  would  soon  meet  him  there.  He 
actually  arrived  there  by  way  of  Mont  Genevre  on 
June  2ist. 

For  nearly  two  years  Vaucluse  was  once  more 
his  home,  and  he  seems  to  have  lived  there  for 
weeks  and  even  months  together  without  interrup- 
tion. Of  course  he  went  sometimes  to  Avignon ; 
during  the  whole  period,  indeed,  business  of  various 
kinds  took  him  there  much  oftener  and  kept  him 
there  much  longer  than  he  liked.  Not  a  few  such 
visits  were  paid  in  connection  with  a  little  incident 
of  monastic  intrigue,  which  gave  him  a  good  deal 
of  occupation  and  must  surely  have  afforded  him 
some  amusement.  To  the  great  Benedictine  abbey 
of  Vallombrosa  were  attached  several  dependent 
religious  houses,  among  which  was  the  abbey  of 
Corvara,  near  Bologna.  In  1351  the  post  of  Abbot 
of  Corvara  fell  vacant ;  the  right  of  nomination  was 
vested  in  the  Abbot  of  Vallombrosa.  Petrarch  and 
his  Florentine  friends  desired  that  the  dignity  should 
be  conferred  on  a  certain  Don  Ubertino ;  Nelli  was 


VAUCLUSE  157 

especially  eager  to  back  Petrarch  in  procuring  this 
appointment,  and  the  Bishop  of  Florence  also  used 
his  influence  in  Ubertino's  favour.  The  Abbot  was 
a  saintly  person,  unused  to  the  ways  of  a  place- 
hunting  world.  He  yielded  to  all  this  pressure  and 
nominated  Don  Ubertino  ;  then  almost  immediately 
he  repented  of  his  decision,  revoked  the  appoint- 
ment, and  made  a  second  nomination  in  favour  of 
Don  Guido,  another  brother  of  the  Order.  Uber- 
tino refused  to  give  way  ;  he  had  got  his  presenta- 
tion, and  he  meant  to  have  the  place.  Guido  was 
equally  firm  in  his  determination  to  be  Abbot  of 
Corvara.  The  dispute  went  for  judgment  to  Avig- 
non ;  and  the  Abbot  of  Vallombrosa  found  himself 
in  a  pitiable  position.  He  was  of  course  disposed 
to  maintain  his  second  nomination,  and  had  for- 
warded papers  in  support  of  it  to  Avignon.  But 
again  the  Bishop  and  Nelli  intervened,  and  induced 
him  to  promise  neutrality.  He  wrote  a  letter  to  his 
lawyer  at  Avignon  full  of  praises  of  Ubertino,  and 
ending  with  the  cryptic  statement  that  he  could  not 
speak  more  explicitly  because  he  had  once  already 
been  accused  of  inconstancy,  and  he  would  not 
incur  the  reproach  a  second  time.  To  the  ordinary 
man's  intelligence  it  seems  rather  as  if  he  had  now 
incurred  it  from  both  sides.  The  affair  draeeed  on 
for  months  ;  the  law  was  not  more  expeditious  at 
Avignon  than  elsewhere,  and  the  decision  was 
further  delayed  by  the  Pope's  illness.  Petrarch 
threw  himself  heart  and  soul  into  Ubertino's  cause  ; 
Fracassetti  even  represents  him  as  arguing  it  in 
court ;  his  own  letters  give  no  warrant  for  this,  but 


158      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

show  that  he  left  nothing  undone  that  influence  and 
solicitation  could  achieve.  "  I  have  become  in 
another's  behalf  what  I  never  have  been  in  my 
own,"  he  writes,  "a  busy  importunate  canvasser." 
The  case  was  heard  at  last  in  full  Consistory ; 
Petrarch's  opinion  was  quoted,  and  his  wishes 
carried  weight  with  Pope  and  Cardinals,  and  much 
to  his  delight  Ubertino  was  declared  lawful  Abbot 
of  Corvara. 

After  settling  this  little  matter  of  ecclesiastical 
patronage,  Petrarch  still  had  occasion  for  frequent 
visits  to  "Babylon."  But  he  stayed  there  no  longer 
than  he  could  help,  and  the  period  from  Mid- 
summer, 1 35 1,  to  the  middle  of  April,  1353,  may 
be  regarded  as  practically  spent  in  his  "Transalpine 
Helicon."  It  was  a  period  of  profuse  letter-writing; 
the  Familiares  are  not  arranged  in  quite  trust- 
worthy chronological  order,  but,  speaking  roughly, 
more  than  five  books  of  them,  from  the  middle  of 
the  eleventh  to  nearly  the  end  of  the  sixteenth, 
were  written  at  this  time.  From  frequent  allusions 
in  these  letters,  we  know  also  that  it  was  a  time  of 
much  reading  and  hard  literary  work,  though  we 
cannot  name  with  certainty  the  books  on  which 
Petrarch  was  engaged.  There  is  a  passage  in  the 
lamentable  letter  to  Socrates  of  June,  1349,  in 
which  Petrarch  says  that  his  friends  are  looking  for 
great  men's  histories  from  his  pen,  but  that  he  has 
now  no  heart  for  anything  but  mourning.  The 
allusion  must  surely  be  to  his  great  and  long- 
forgotten  work,  the  Lives  of  Illiistrioiis  Men,  and 
we    may    infer   that    this    history   of    the    Roman 


VAUCLUSE  159 

Republic,  written  in  the  form  of  a  series  of  bio- 
graphies, from  Romulus  to  Julius  Caesar,  had  been 
well  advanced  in  the  earlier  periods  of  his  residence 
at  Vaucluse  ;  it  is  reasonable  to  conjecture  further 
that  on  getting  back  to  his  books,  and  resuming  his 
usual  habits  of  work,  Petrarch  would  devote  himself 
anew  to  its  composition,  but  he  did  not  quite  com- 
plete it,  for  at  the  end  of  1354  he  told  the  Emperor 
that  "he  still  wanted  time  and  leisure  to  give  it  the 
final  touches."  Italian  politics,  too,  as  we  shall  have 
occasion  to  note  later,  occupied  much  of  his  time 
and  thought  during  these  years.  But  above  all, 
this  is  a  period  of  happy  country  life  in  the  beauti- 
ful valley  of  the  Sorgue,  and  there  are  no  more 
delightful  passages  in  the  whole  range  of  Petrarch's 
writings  than  those  in  which  he  describes  its 
charms.  A  complete  collection  of  these  passages 
would  fill  a  fair-sized  volume.  Here  we  must  be 
content  with  the  description  of  his  life  given  in  a 
letter  to  Nelli  In  the  summer  of  1352.  He  writes 
as  follows : — 

"  I  am  spending  the  summer  at  the  source  of  the 
Sorgue.  You  know  what  comes  next  without  my 
saying  It,  but  as  you  bid  me  speak,  I  will  tell  you  In 
a  few  words. 

"  I  have  declared  war  on  my  body.  May  He 
without  whose  aid  I  must  fail  so  help  me,  as  gullet 
belly,  tongue,  ears,  and  eyes  often  seem  to  me  to  be 
not  my  own  members,  but  my  undutiful  foes.  Many 
are  the  evils  which  I  remember  having  suffered 
from  them,  especially  from  the  eyes,  which  have 
led  me  into  all  my  falls.     Now  I  have  shut  them  up 


i6o     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

here  so  that  they  can  see  hardly  anything  but  sky, 
hills,  and  streams ;  neither  gold,  nor  jewels,  nor 
ivory,  nor  purple  cloth,  nor  horses,  except  two  mere 
ponies,  which  carry  me  round  the  valleys  in  com- 
pany with  a  single  lad.  Lastly,  I  never  see  the  face 
of  a  woman,  except  that  of  my  bailiffs  wife,  and  if 
you  saw  her,  you  might  suppose  yourself  to  be  look- 
ing on  a  patch  of  the  Libyan  or  Ethiopian  desert. 
'Tis  a  scorched,  sunburnt  countenance,  with  not  a 
trace  of  freshness  or  juice  remaining ;  had  Helen 
worn  such  a  face,  Troy  would  still  be  standing ;  had 
Lucretia  and  Virginia  been  thus  dowered,  Tar- 
quinius  had  not  lost  his  kingdom,  nor  Appius  died 
in  his  prison.  But  let  me  not,  after  this  description 
of  her  aspect,  rob  the  goodwife  of  the  eulogy  due  to 
her  virtues ;  her  soul  is  as  white  as  her  skin  is 
swarthy.  She  is  a  bright  example  of  female  ugli- 
ness boding  no  harm  to  man.  And  I  might  say 
more  on  this  head,  if  Seneca  had  not  dealt  with  the 
theme  at  length  in  his  letters  which  allude  to  his 
Claranum.  My  bailiffs  wife  has  this  singular  pro- 
perty, that  while  beauty  is  in  general  an  attribute 
proper  rather  to  woman  than  to  man,  she  is  so  little 
affected  by  the  want  of  it  that  you  may  reckon  her 
ugliness   becominor   to   her.      There   never   was   a 

o  o 

trustier,  humbler,  more  laborious  creature.  In  the 
sun's  full  blaze,  where  the  very  grasshopper  can 
scarce  bear  the  heat,  she  spends  her  whole  days  in 
the  fields,  and  her  tanned  hide  laughs  at  Leo  and 
Cancer.  At  evening  the  old  dame  returns  home, 
and  busies  her  unwearied,  invincible  little  body 
about  household  work,  with  such  vigour  that  you 


VAUCLUSE  i6i 

might  suppose  her  a  lass  fresh  from  the  bed- 
chamber. Not  a  murmur  all  this  time,  not  a 
grumble,  no  hint  of  trouble  in  her  mind,  only  in- 
credible care  lavished  on  her  husband  and  childreu, 
on  me,  on  my  household,  and  on  the  guests  who 
come  to  see  me,  and  at  the  same  time  an  in- 
credible scorn  for  her  own  comfort.  This  woman 
of  stone  has  a  heap  of  sacking-  on  the  bare  ground 
for  her  bed.  Her  food  is  bread  well-nigh  as  hard 
as  iron,  her  drink  wine  which  might  more  justly  be 
styled  vinegar  drowned  in  water ;  if  you  offer  her 
anything  of  mellower  flavour,  long  custom  has 
taught  her  to  think  the  softer  victual  hard.  But 
enough  about  my  bailiff's  wife,  who  would  not  have 
engaged  my  pen  except  in  a  country  letter.  Well, 
this  is  my  eyes'  discipline.  What  shall  I  say  of  my 
ears  ?  Here  I  have  no  solace  of  song  or  flute  or 
viol,  which,  elsewhere,  are  wont  to  carry  me  out  of 
myself;  all  such  sweetness  the  breeze  has  wafted 
away  from  me.  Here  the  only  sounds  are  the 
occasional  lowing  of  cattle  and  bleating  of  sheep, 
the  sonpfs  of  the  birds,  and  the  ceaseless  murmur  of 
the  stream.  What  of  my  tongue,  by  which  I  have 
often  raised  my  own  spirits,  and  sometimes  perhaps 
those  of  others  ?  Now  it  lies  low,  and  is  often 
silent  from  dawn  to  dusk,  for  it  has  no  one  ex- 
cept me  to  talk  to.  As  to  my  gullet  and  belly,  I 
have  so  disciplined  them,  that  my  herdsman's 
bread  is  often  enough  for  me,  and  I  even  enjoy 
it,  and  I  leave  the  white  bread,  brought  me 
from  a  distance,  to  be  eaten  by  the  servants  who 
fetched  it.     To  such  an  extent  does  custom  stand 


i62      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

me  in  the  stead  of  luxury.  And  so  my  bailiff  and 
good  friend,  who  humours  all  my  whims,  and  has 
himself  a  constitution  of  stone,  has  no  quarrel  with 
me  on  any  subject,  except  that  my  fare  is  harder 
than  he  says  a  man  can  put  up  with  for  any  time. 
I,  on  the  other  hand,  am  persuaded  that  such  fare 
can  be  tolerated  longer  than  luxurious  living,  which 
the  satirist  declares  to  be  most  wearisome,  and  not 
to  be  endured  five  days  together.  Grapes,  figs, 
nuts,  and  almonds  are  my  delicacies.  And  I 
thoroughly  enjoy  the  little  fish  which  abound  in  this 
river,  especially  the  catching  of  them,  a  pursuit  in 
which  I  am  most  diligent,  and  very  fond  of  handling 
both  hook  and  net.  What  shall  I  tell  you  of  my 
clothes  and  shoes  ?  They  are  changed  from  top  to 
toe.  Not  such  was  my  old  fashion.  '  Mine,'  I  say, 
because  of  the  surpassing  vanity  with  which,  while 
observing  the  proprieties,  I  trust,  and  holding  fast 
by  seemliness,  it  was  my  pleasure  of  old  to  shine 
among  my  equals.  Now  you  would  take  me  for  a 
ploughman  or  a  shepherd,  though  all  the  while  I 
have  finer  clothes  here  with  me,  but  there  is  no 
reason  for  changing  my  dress  except  that  the 
clothes  which  I  choose  to  wear  first  get  dirty  first. 
My  old  bonds  are  loosed,  and  the  eyes  which  I  once 
sought  to  please  are  closed  for  ever ;  and  I  think 
that,  even  if  they  were  still  open,  they  would  not 
now  have  their  wonted  mastery  over  me.  But  in 
my  own  eyes  I  never  look  so  well  as  when  loose- 
girt  and  free.  And  what  can  I  tell  you  of  my 
dwellinor  ?  You  might  take  it  for  the  house  of  Cato 
or  Fabricius.     There  I  live  with  a  single  dog  and 


k 


VAUCLUSE  163 

only  two  servants.  I  gave  the  slip  to  all  the  rest 
in  Italy,  and  would  that  I  had  given  them  the  slip 
on  the  journey  so  that  they  could  never  get  back  to 
me,  for  they  are  the  one  hurricane  that  wrecks  my 
peace.  My  bailiff,  however,  lives  in  the  adjoining 
house,  always  at  hand  whenever  he  can  be  of 
service,  but  with  a  door  that  can  shut  off  his 
quarters  at  any  moment,  if  I  feel  the  least  symptom 
of  boredom  at  his  being  always  in  waiting. 

"  Here  I  have  fashioned  me  two  little  gardens, 
the  most  apt  in  the  world  to  my  fancy  and  desire  ; 
should  I  try  to  picture  them  to  you,  this  letter 
would  be  long  drawn  out.  In  a  word,  I  think  the 
world  scarce  holds  their  like,  and  if  I  must  confess 
my  womanish  frivolity,  I  am  in  a  huff  that  such 
beauty  should  exist  anywhere  out  of  Italy.  The 
one  I  always  call  my  Transalpine  Helicon,  for  it  is 
bowered  in  shade,  made  for  study  as  for  nothing 
else,  and  consecrated  to  my  Apollo.  It  lies  close 
to  the  pool  in  which  the  Sorgue  rises,  beyond  which 
is  only  a  trackless  crag,  quite  inaccessible  except  to 
wild  animals  and  birds.  My  other  garden  lies  close 
to  my  house ;  it  has  a  better-tilled  appearance,  and 
Brome's  nursling  (Bacchus)  has  his  favourite  plant 
there.  This,  strange  to  say,  lies  in  the  middle  of 
the  beautiful  swift  river,  and  close  by,  separated 
only  by  a  little  bridge  at  the  end  of  the  house, 
hangs  the  arch  of  a  grotto  of  natural  rock,  which 
under  this  blazing  sky  makes  the  summer  heat  im- 
perceptible. It  is  a  place  to  fire  the  soul  to  study, 
and  I  think  not  unlike  the  little  court  where  Cicero 
used  to  declaim  his  speeches,  except  that  his  place 


i64     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

had  no  Sorgue  flowing  by  it.  Under  this  grotto, 
then,  I  sit  at  noon  ;  my  morning  is  spent  on  the 
hills,  my  evening  in  the  meadows,  or  in  that  wilder 
little  garden,  close  to  the  source,  where  design  has 
embellished  nature,  where  there  is  a  spot  in  mid- 
stream overshadowed  by  the  lofty  crag,  a  tiny  spot 
indeed,  but  full  of  lively  promptings  by  which  even 
a  sluggard  soul  may  be  goaded  to  high  imaginings. 
What  would  you  have  ?  I  might  well  spend  my 
life  here,  if  it  were  not  at  once  so  far  from  Italy 
and  so  near  to  Avignon.  For  why  should  I  try  to 
hide  from  you  my  twin  weakness  ?  Love  of  the 
one  soothes  my  sorrow  and  plucks  at  my  heart ; 
hatred  of  the  other  goads  and  exasperates  me,  and 
seeing  that  the  loathsome  stench  of  her  breeds 
plague  throughout  the  world,  is  it  any  wonder  if 
her  too  near  neighbourhood  pollutes  the  sweet  air 
of  this  little  country-side  ?  It  will  drive  me  away 
from  here ;  I  know  it  will.  Meanwhile  you  know 
my  mood.  The  one  thing  I  long  for  is  the  sight  of 
you  and  my  few  surviving  friends  ;  the  one  thing  I 
dread  is  a  return  to  city  life.     Farewell." 

Only  a  few  months  after  this  letter  was  written, 
the  faithful  farm-bailiff,  Raymond  Monet,  who  had 
been  truly  a  friend  as  well  as  a  servant  to  his 
master  for  many  years,  died,  and  Petrarch,  then  at 
Avignon,  wrote  to  the  Cardinals  Talleyrand  and  Gui 
de  Boulosfne,  askingr  them  to  sanction  his  immediate 
return  to  Vaucluse.  Regulus,  he  says,  asked  leave 
to  return  from  Africa  at  a  critical  moment  to  look 
after  his  farm  at  home  on  account  of  his  bailiff's 
death,  and  Gnseus  Scipio  similarly  asked  leave  of 


VAUCLUSE  165 

absence  from  Spain  to  portion  his  daughter.  "Now 
I,"  says  Petrarch,  writing  on  January  5th,  "may 
support  my  appeal  for  leave  of  absence  by  the 
precedent  of  both  these  great  generals  ;  for  by  my 
bailiffs  death  yesterday  not  only  does  my  farm  run 
the  risk  of  neglect,  but  my  library,  which  is  my 
adopted  daughter,  has  lost  her  guardian.  For  my 
bailiff,"  he  goes  on,  "though  a  countryman,  was 
gifted  with  more  than  a  townsman's  forethought 
and  refinement  of  manners.  I  think  earth  never 
bore  a  more  loyal  creature.  In  a  word,  this  one 
man  by  his  surpassing  fidelity  compensated  and 
made  amends  for  the  sins  and  treacheries  of  the 
whole  race  of  servants,  as  to  which  I  have  not  only 
to  make  daily  complaint  by  word  of  mouth,  but 
have  sometimes  put  my  complaints  into  writing. 
And  so  I  had  given  into  his  charge  myself,  my 
property,  and  all  the  books  which  I  have  in  Gaul ; 
and  whereas  my  shelves  contain  every  sort  and 
size  of  volume,  mixed  big  and  little  together,  and  I 
myself  have  often  been  absent  for  long  periods, 
never  once  on  my  return  have  I  found  a  single 
volume  missing,  or  even  moved  from  its  proper 
place.  Though  unlettered  himself,  he  had  a  devo- 
tion to  letters,  and  he  took  special  pains  with  the 
books  which  he  knew  I  valued  most.  Much  hand- 
ling of  them  had  by  this  time  taught  him  to  know 
the  works  of  the  ancients  by  name,  and  to  dis- 
tinguish my  own  small  treatises  from  them.  He 
would  beam  with  delight  whenever  I  gave  him  a 
book  to  hold,  and  would  clasp  it  to  his  bosom 
with    a    sicjh.      Sometimes    under    his    breath    he 


i66     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

would  call  upon  its  author  by  name,  and,  strange 
as  it  may  sound,  the  mere  touch  of  the  books 
gave  him  an  enjoyable  feeling  of  advancement 
in  learning.  And  now  I  have  lost  this  excellent 
guardian  of  my  property,  with  whom  for  fifteen 
years  I  have  been  wont  to  share  all  my  troubles, 
who  was  to  me,  so  to  speak,  as  a  priest  of  Ceres, 
and  whose  house  served  me  for  a  temple  of 
fidelity.  Two  days  since,  in  obedience  to  your 
Eminences'  summons,  I  came  away,  and  left  him  as 
I  thought  slightly  indisposed.  He  was  an  old  man, 
it  is  true,  but,  as  Maro  says,  of  a  hale  and  green  old 
age.  Yesterday  at  evening  he  left  me,  called  hence 
to  attendance  on  a  better  Master.  May  He  grant 
uninterrupted  repose  to  his  soul  after  the  many 
labours  of  his  body  here.  His  one  prayer  to  God 
was  for  repose.  This  he  seeks  at  Thy  hands ;  deny 
him  not  this,  O  Christ.  Grant  him  to  dwell  no 
longer  in  my  house,  but  in  the  house  of  the  Lord, 
to  regard  the  Lord's  pleasure,  not  mine,  and  to 
have  his  conversation  in  His  temple,  instead  of  in 
my  fields,  where  he  laboured  many  years  with 
limbs  hardened  to  cold  and  heat  alike.  In  my 
service  he  found  toil ;  in  Thine  let  him  find  rest. 
At  Thy  command  the  bonds  of  his  old  prison-house 
have  been  loosed  and  he  has  come  to  Thee. 

"One  of  my  servants,  who  happened  to  be  present 
at  his  death,  brought  me  the  sad  news  as  quickly  as 
possible,  and  arriving  here  late  last  night,  told  me 
that  he  had  breathed  his  last,  after  making  frequent 
mention  of  my  name,  and  calling  with  tears  on  the 
name  of  Christ.      I  grieved  sincerely,  and  my  grief 


VAUCLUSE  167 

would  have  been  still  more  bitter,  had  not  the  good 
man's  acre  lono-  since  warned  me  that  I  must  look 
for  this  bereavement. 

"  So  I  must  go.  Give  me  leave,  I  pray  you,  most 
eminent  Fathers,  and  let  me  go  from  the  city  where 
I  am  of  no  service,  to  the  country  where  I  am 
wanted,  and  where  I  am  more  anxious  about  my 
library  than  about  my  farm." 

Great  as  were  the  joys  and  sorrows  of  life  at 
Vaucluse,  they  were  far  from  monopolising  Pet- 
rarch's attention.  His  spirit  had  regained  its  buoy- 
ancy, and  once  more  he  threw  himself  heart  and 
soul  into  the  great  drama  of  Italian  politics.  The 
years  135 1-3  were  fruitful  in  episodes  of  that 
drama.  The  war  between  Venice  and  Genoa,  the 
pacification  of  Naples,  the  appointment  of  a  Com- 
mission to  regulate  the  government  of  Rome,  and 
the  imprisonment  and  release  of  Rienzi  at  Avignon, 
the  death  of  Clement  VI,  and  the  election  of 
Innocent  VI  to  succeed  him,  all  belong  to  these 
eventful  years. 

With  the  struggle  for  the  supremacy  of  the  sea 
Petrarch  had  no  very  direct  concern,  but  no  one 
who  valued  the  safety  of  Europe,  least  of  all  an 
Italian  patriot,  could  see  without  alarm  the  two 
great  maritime  republics  wasting  their  strength  on 
internecine  war,  while  the  weakness  of  Constanti- 
nople and  the  constant  growth  of  the  Moslem  power 
might  at  any  moment  create  a  situation  of  urgent 
peril  to  the  West.  Clement  was  probably  a  shrewder 
politician  than  those  who  saw  only  the  pleasure- 
loving  side  of  his  nature  suspected ;  he  did  his  best 


i68      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

to  bring  about  peace,  and  it  may  have  been  at 
his  instigation  that  Petrarch,  whose  letters  re- 
ceived a  consideration  that  would  not  now  be 
accorded  to  the  appeals  of  even  the  most  dis- 
tinguished amateur  diplomatist,  wrote  in  terms  of 
eloquent  entreaty  and  fervid  exhortation  to  the 
rulers  of  both  states.  But  neither  formal  nor  in- 
formal diplomacy  availed  to  stay  the  war.  In 
February,  1352,  the  fleets  had  a  drawn  battle. 
Eighteen  months  later,  the  Venetians  under  Pisani 
gained  their  overwhelming  victory  off  Sardinia.  A 
shameful  flight  saved  the  Genoese  Admiral  Grim- 
aldi  and  a  third  of  his  force ;  the  rest  of  the 
Genoese  fleet  was  either  sunk  or  captured.  For 
the  moment  Venice  remained  mistress  of  the 
Mediterranean. 

In  the  affairs  of  Naples  Petrarch  took  a  closer 
personal  interest,  though  apparently  no  active  share. 
Here  again  the  Pope  was  chief  mediator.  After 
months  of  negotiation,  in  the  course  of  which  he 
did  a  stroke  of  business  for  the  Papacy  in  buying 
the  Countship  of  Provence  from  Queen  Joanna, 
Clement  succeeded  in  brina-ino:  the  hostile  factions 
to  terms.  The  King  of  Hungary  recognised  Lewis 
of  Tarentum,  Joanna's  cousin,  paramour,  and  second 
husband,  as  King  of  the  Two  Sicilies,  and  for  a 
while  the  land  had  peace.  Lewis  was  now  first  in 
rank  at  Naples  ;  but  first  in  influence  and  power 
stood  the  King's  tutor  in  the  art  of  statesmanship, 
the  great  Florentine,  Niccolo  Acciaiuoli,  who  be- 
came Grand  Seneschal  of  the  realm.  Though  not 
yet  personally  acquainted  with  Petrarch,  Acciaiuoli 


VAUCLUSE  i6g 

was  excellently  disposed  in  his  favour,  for  he 
knew  intimately  the  whole  circle  of  his  Florentine 
friends  :  his  own  brother  Angelo,  in  fact,  the  Bishop 
of  Florence,  was  included  in  that  circle,  and  enjoyed 
Petrarch's  hospitality  at  Vaucluse  in  the  spring  of 
1352.  In  the  Grand  Seneschal,  Petrarch  saw  a  not 
unworthy  successor  to  King  Robert,  alike  as  a  ruler 
and  a  patron  of  letters. 

Interesting  as  were  the  politics  of  the  maritime 
republics  and  of  Naples,  the  magic  word  Rome 
evoked  a  far  deeper  sentiment.  Since  the  fall  of 
Rienzi,  confusion  had  reigned  in  the  city.  The 
Jubilee  had  brought  a  kind  of  truce,  for  the  Romans 
thoroughly  understood  the  value  of  their  city  as  a 
place  of  pilgrimage.  But  Clement  was  too  sensible 
to  take  the  temporary  toleration  of  his  Legate  as  a 
sign  of  settled  order,  and  appointed  a  Commission 
of  four  Cardinals  to  advise  him  on  the  necessary 
reforms.  In  the  autumn  of  1351  this  Commission 
asked  Petrarch  to  lay  his  views  before  them,  and 
he  did  so  in  two  letters,  which  illustrate  and  empha- 
sise in  a  remarkable  manner  the  sincerity  and  con- 
sistency of  his  views.  Writing  under  a  full  sense 
of  responsibility,  and  writing  to  Princes  of  the 
Church,  whose  sympathies  would  naturally  be  with 
the  ruling  class,  he  repeats  the  conviction  expressed 
five  years  earlier  to  Rienzi,  that  the  Baronial  Houses 
were  the  eternal  enemies  of  Rome's  peace,  and  that 
if  good  government  was  to  be  made  possible  in  the 
city,  the  magistracy  must  be  recruited,  not  from 
them,  but  from  the  ranks  of  the  people. 

Only  a  few  months  after  this  correspondence  with 


I70     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

the  Cardinals,  Rienzi  himself  appeared  in  Avignon, 
a  prisoner  in  peril  of  his  life.  He  had  taken 
refuge  with  the  Emperor :  the  latter  cannot  be 
severely  blamed  if  he  showed  scant  sympathy  with 
the  upstart  who  had  summoned  to  his  bar  the  heir 
of  the  Caesars.  The  Pope  wanted  to  have  Rienzi ; 
the  Emperor  had  no  pleasure  in  keeping  him  :  to 
the  Pope  he  went.  The  chamber  which  was  his 
prison  is  shown  to  all  who  visit  the  Papal  palace, 
and  they  are  told  that  he  was  released  from  it  at 
the  intercession  of  his  friend  Petrarch.  There  is 
no  written  authority  for  this  gracious  legend,  but 
two  things  are  certain  :  Petrarch  was  in  a  fury  of 
indignation  at  Rienzi's  imprisonment,  and  the  reason 
which  he  assigns  for  his  release  could  have  no 
validity  outside  Crotchet  Castle.  He  was  in  a  fury 
because,  as  he  thundered,  Rienzi  was  arraigned  not 
for  his  bad  deeds,  but  for  his  good ;  not  for  betray- 
ing the  cause  of  Rome,  but  for  having  dared  to 
assert  her  sovereignty.  Rienzi  was  in  the  grip  of 
wicked  men  ;  how  could  he  ever  expect  deliver- 
ance ?  Hear  the  astonishing  story.  Through  the 
modern  Babylon  ran  a  rumour  that  Rienzi  was  a 
poet.  What !  A  sacred  bard  lies  chained  in  this 
city  of  culture.  Off  with  his  gyves !  And  Rienzi 
comes  out  a  free  man.  As  history  this  is  a  little 
thin,  and  it  is  pleasant  to  think  that  he  who  cir- 
culated it  may,  after  all,  have  had  a  hand  in  the 
happy  deliverance. 

In  August,  1352,  occurred  a  curious  little  episode, 
of  which  the  details  are  somewhat  obscure,  though 
the  main  fact  is  clear.     The  papal  secretaryship  was 


VAUCLUSE  171 

again  vacant,  and  two  of  Petrarch's  friends  among 
the  Cardinals  used  secret  influence  to  get  it  offered 
to  him.  Again  he  wisely  shrank  from  the  un- 
congenial burden,  and  in  his  turn  took  secret 
measures  to  defeat  his  friends'  well-meant  but  un- 
welcome scheme.  What  reason  can  there  have 
been  for  all  this  mystery  ?  Once  before  the  office 
had  been  openly  offered  and  declined ;  the  same 
kind  of  thing  was  to  happen,  formally  or  informally, 
three  times  more  in  the  course  of  the  next  twelve 
years.  Why  this  manoeuvre  of  sap  and  countersap 
now  ?  Possibly  the  Cardinals  may  have  wanted  to 
confront  him  with  2.  fait  accompli ;  possibly  he  may 
have  feared  to  wound  their  susceptibilities  by  open 
opposition.  The  reasons  are  all  conjectural,  but 
there  is  ample  warrant  for  the  fact. 

This  was  not  the  only  preferment  resigned  by 
Petrarch  in  this  year.  In  the  autumn  he  was 
appointed  to  a  canonry  at  Modena,  but  being 
already  provided  with  a  sufficient  income,  he  sent 
the  presentation  to  Luca  Cristiano  on  October  19th, 
and  the  terms  of  the  accompanying  letter  in  which 
he  explained  his  action  are  a  model  of  that  delicate 
tact  which  makes  it  possible  for  one  friend  to  accept 
a  service  of  this  kind  from  another. 

Rienzi  had  been  set  free  in  August,  1352.  At 
the  end  of  the  year  the  Pope,  who  had  admired  his 
eloquence,  tolerated  his  power,  and  profited  by  his 
fall,  was  no  more.  For  some  time  Clement  had 
been  in  failing  health.  In  the  spring  of  the  year 
Petrarch,  who  held  all  physicians  for  quacks,  as 
indeed  at  that  time  of  the  world's  history  most  of 


172      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

them  were,  wrote  the  Pope  a  letter  warning  him  to 
beware  of  their  practices.  This  brought  on  the 
poet  the  hatred  of  the  medical  profession,  and  a 
controvery  ensued  of  which  we  can  read  only  one 
side.  Our  estate  would  be  the  more  gracious  if  we 
could  read  neither :  to  those  who  love  Petrarch  best 
as  a  man,  he  must  appear  most  detestable  as  a 
controversialist.  Whether  in  spite  of  his  physicians' 
exertions  or  because  of  them,  Clement  died  on 
December  6th,  1352,  and  twelve  days  later  the 
Sacred  College,  spurred  to  haste  by  information  that 
King  John  of  France  meditated  a  visit  to  their 
neighbourhood,  chose  Stefano  Alberti,  Cardinal  of 
Ostia,  to  succeed  him. 

Clement's  successor  took  the  name  of  Inno- 
cent VI  ;  to  those  who  regard  innocence  as 
synonymous  with  ignorance,  the  choice  must  have 
seemed  admirable.  It  is  only  fair  to  add  that 
the  new  Pope  had  a  better  title  to  it  in  the 
exemplary  austerity  of  his  life.  He  checked  the 
licence  of  the  Papal  Court,  reformed  abuses,  and 
insisted  on  bishops  living  in  their  dioceses  ;  but  his 
ignorance  was  appalling.  Here  in  the  middle  of 
the  fourteenth  century,  at  the  head  of  the  Church, 
which  numbered  in  her  ranks  five-sixths  of  the 
educated  men  of  Europe,  was  a  Pope  who,  at  the 
suggestion  of  a  malevolent  Cardinal,  seriously  pro- 
posed to  excommunicate  Petrarch  as  a  necromancer, 
on  the  sole  ground  that  he  was  a  student  of  Virgil. 
The  absurd  sentence  was  never  passed  ;  many  of 
the  influential  Cardinals  were  well  affected  to  Pet- 
rarch, and  it  so  happened  that  his  especial  friend 


VAUCLUSE  173 

Cardinal  Talleyrand  had  been  instrumental  in  pro- 
curing Innocent's  election.  But  for  a  moment  the 
ridiculous  accusation  was  a  serious  danger,  and 
however  abominable  Petrarch  may  have  found 
Avignon  in  the  past,  its  neighbourhood  must  have 
seemed  yet  more  destestable  when  the  rude  bigotry 
of  Innocent  had  taken  the  place  of  Clement's  refined 
taste  and  kindly  tolerance. 


CHAPTER    XI 

MILAN   AND  THE   VISCONTI 

1353-1354 

PETRARCH  had  meant  to  spend  the  winter  in 
Italy.  On  November  i6th,  1352,  he  started 
from  Vaucluse  in  fine  weather,  which  had  been  un- 
broken for  many  weeks,  but  he  had  hardly  left  the 
valley  when  a  gentle  drizzle  set  in,  which  presently 
turned  to  a  heavy  rain,  and  as  the  day  wore  on  to 
a  veritable  deluge.  He  took  shelter  at  Cavaillon, 
where  he  found  the  Bishop  indisposed,  but  declaring 
himself  cured  by  the  sight  of  him.  Philip  besought 
him  to  give  up  the  idea  of  his  journey,  and  in  the 
course  of  the  night  came  news  that  the  roads  round 
Nice  were  closed  to  travellers  by  armed  bands  of 
the  mountaineers.  All  through  the  night  the  rain 
fell  in  torrents,  and  in  the  morning  Petrarch  found 
his  friend's  entreaties,  which  in  themselves  had 
been  nearly  enough  to  turn  him,  supported  by  the 
fact  that  "one  route  was  made  impassable  by  war, 
and  all  by  flood."  It  seemed,  he  thought,  as  if  God 
would  not  have  him  go  forward,  and  he  returned 
presently  to  Vaucluse.  In  the  spring  of  1353  he 
resumed  the  project.  In  April  he  paid  a  visit  to 
his  brother  Gherardo,  whom  he  had  not  seen  for 
more   than    five    years,    but    of  whose    courageous 

174 


MILAN    AND   THE   VISCONTI      175 

conduct,  when  Montrieu  was  devastated  by  the 
plague,  he  had  heard  an  account  some  two  years 
before,  which  had  filled  him  with  joy  and  admira- 
tion. Not  only  had  Gherardo  refused  to  desert 
the  post  in  which  he  believed  Christ  had  set  him, 
but  when  the  plague  came,  and  brother  after  brother 
fell  a  victim  to  it,  he  spent  his  whole  time  nursing 
the  sick,  giving  absolution  to  the  dying,  and  bury- 
ing the  dead.  Then  he  found  himself,  with  one 
faithful  dog,  the  sole  survivor  of  a  house  which  had 
numbered  over  thirty  brethren.  Marauders  came 
to  pillage  the  defenceless  shrine  ;  Gherardo  opposed 
their  entrance,  and  they  slunk  away  abashed. 
Then,  having  saved  the  sacred  edifice  and  its  con- 
tents, he  set  himself  to  have  it  repeopled,  and 
applied  to  the  principal  monastery  of  his  Order,  not 
for  any  reward  or  recognition  of  his  services,  but  to 
have  new  brethren  given  him  and  a  new  prior  set 
over  him.  To  this  brother,  whom  Dr.  Koerting 
has  aptly  called  "Francesco  without  the  modern 
elements,"  the  latter  had  a  whole-hearted  attach- 
ment. From  an  unsteady,  headstrong  youth,  Gher- 
ardo had  grown  to  be  a  man  of  singularly  resolute 
character,  and  the  elder  brother,  whom  his  conduct 
had  formerly  inspired  with  grave  anxiety,  now 
looked  with  unqualified  admiration  on  his  piety  and 
self-devotion.  His  visits  to  Montrieu  were  rare, 
but  they  evidently  gave  him  unqualified  pleasure, 
and  he  warmly  recommended  the  monastery,  through 
his  brother-poet  Zanobi  da  Strada,  another  of  his 
Florentine  friends,  to  the  favour  of  Acciaiuoli  and 
the   Court  of  Naples.      From   Montrieu    he  went 


176     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

back  to  Vaucluse,  and  on  April  26th  paid  what 
proved  to  be  his  last  visit  to  the  city  which  had  so 
deeply  influenced  his  fortunes,  where  so  much  of  his 
life  had  been  spent,  and  which,  in  spite  of  its  associa- 
tions with  Laura  and  with  Socrates,  he  so  cordially 
detested.  He  went  back  to  make  preparations  for 
what  he  intended,  as  in  fact  it  proved,  to  be  his  final 
departure  from  Provence. 

Early  in  May  he  set  out,  travelling  as  he  had 
come  two  years  before,  by  the  direct  route  over  Mont 
Genevre.  As  on  his  descent  from  the  top  of  the  pass 
he  left  the  clouds  behind  him,  and  "the  soft,  warm  air, 
rising  from  the  Italian  valley,  caressed  his  cheek," 
the  sight  of  Piedmont  spread  out  to  the  eastward 
smote  him  with  gladness,  and  in  a  poem  of  eighteen 
hexameters  he  poured  out  a  salutation  to  "  the  land 
beloved  of  God,  the  land  of  unmatched  beauty,  the 
land  rich  in  wealth  and  in  men,  the  mistress  of  the 
world,  on  whom  art  and  nature  had  lavished  their 
choicest  favours,  and  to  whom  he  was  now  eagerly 
returning,  never  again  to  depart  from  her."  It  is 
not  pretended  that  in  workmanship  these  lines  can 
equal  the  hexameters  of  Virgil,  or  even  of  Politian, 
but  they  are  veritably  a  great  lyric,  for  almost  alone 
among  Petrarch's  Latin  verses  they  utter  the  note 
of  rapturous  inspiration. 

This  salutation  to  Italy  was  written  on  the  spot. 
It  is  very  probable  that  the  sight  of  those  glorious 
valleys  stretching  away  from  Mont  Genevre  in- 
spired Petrarch  also  with  the  idea  of  his  greatest 
Italian  poem,  the  Ode  to  the  Lords  of  Italy.  Various 
dates  have  been  assigned  to  this  supreme  lyric,  but 


MILAN    AND   THE   VISCONTI      177 

the  best  choice  seems  to  He  between  1345,  the  time 
approximately  assigned  by  De  Sade  and  Fracas- 
setti,  when  the  earher  depredations  of  the  Great 
Company  inflicted  new  sufferings  on  Italy,  and 
1353  or  1354,  the  time  suggested  by  Gesualdo  and 
preferred  here,  when  Petrarch,  returning  to  the 
valley  of  the  Po,  found  the  princes  and  republics 
of  his  country  bidding  against  each  other  for  the 
service  of  similar  bands  of  foreign  mercenaries. 
Every  line  of  this  glorious  ode  burns  with  the  fire 
of  purest  patriotism  ;  it  is  a  cry  of  lamentation  over 
his  Italy's  wounds,  of  passionate  entreaty  to  her 
princes  for  union  and  for  peace,  and  of  prayer  to 
God,  wrung  from  the  suppliant's  very  soul,  that 
He,  who  for  pity  of  man  came  down  from  heaven, 
will  turn  and  look  upon  the  beloved  sweet  country, 
and  soften  the  hard  hearts  of  those  who  afflict  her 
with  war.  Here  is  the  real  national  hymn  of  Italy; 
for  five  hundred  years  it  haunted  the  imagination 
of  those  who  dreamed  of  her  unity,  gave  inspiration 
to  the  counsels  of  her  statesmen,  and  nerved  the 
arm  of  her  soldiers.  The  unsurpassed  beauty  of 
the  poem  as  a  lyric  is  almost  equalled  by  its  fruit- 
fulness  in  political  result. 

If  this  was,  indeed,  the  time  at  which  the  ode 
Italia  Mia  was  composed,  there  is  a  pathos  which 
can  without  exaa-o-eration  be  called  tracric,  in  the 
fact  that  it  coincides  with  the  least  excusable  error 
of  Petrarch's  life,  the  one  action  in  which  he  seemed 
to  fall  below  his  high  standard  of  patriotism.  He 
had  hardly  touched  Italian  soil,  when  he  accepted 
the  shameful  patronage  of  the  Archbishop  of  Milan. 


178      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Of  all  the  ruling  families  who  afflicted  Italy  in 
the  fourteenth  century,  the  Visconti  were  the  most 
odious.  It  is  true  that  their  fellow-tyrants  could 
not  be  excelled  in  the  magnitude  of  their  vices,  but 
few  were  so  ill-provided  with  compensating  virtues. 
The  viper  was  the  appropriate  cognisance  of  the 
House,  and  its  present  head,  the  Archbishop 
Giovanni,  habitually  goes  by  the  name  of  the  Great 
Viper  in  the  pages  of  Villani's  chronicle.  In  truth 
he  had  just  the  qualities  with  which  the  serpent  is 
credited — its  cunning,  its  callousness,  and  its  poison. 
If  he  had  not  the  wanton  ferocity  of  his  great- 
nephew  Bernabo,  his  cold,  deliberate  ruthlessness 
seemed  almost  more  hateful.  That  he  was  a  con- 
summately able  and  successful  statesman  is  indis- 
putable, but  we  find  no  hint  in  his  career  that  his 
lust  of  power  was  ever  checked  by  a  scruple,  or  lit 
by  a  ray  of  magnanimity. 

Luchino  had  died  in  his  bed  in  January,  1349: 
an  event  not  quite  so  rare  in  the  Visconti  family  as 
in  some  others.  Giovanni  succeeded  him,  and  the 
power  of  Milan  stood  higher  than  ever.  With 
Luchino  Petrarch  had  had  some  amicable  corre- 
spondence, initiated  by  the  ruler  of  Milan,  who 
asked  for  a  copy  of  verses  and  some  plants  from 
the  poet's  garden.  Both  verses  and  plants  were 
sent,  accompanied  by  a  letter  couched  in  the  courtly 
terms  of  compliment  required  by  good  manners  in 
that  age,  but  giving  Luchino  not  ambiguously  to 
understand  that  the  encouragement  of  men  of 
letters  is  the  chief  glory  of  princes.  Now  as  Pet- 
rarch passed  through   Milan  in  uncertainty  where 


THE   F.OUKS'IRIAN   STATUK   OK   liKRNABO    VlSCONTl 


MILAN    AND   THE   VISCONTI      179 

to  go  next,  Giovanni,  "the  oreatest  of  Italian 
princes,"  laid  on  him  hands  of  friendly  compulsion, 
and  persuaded  him  to  fix  his  abode  there.  From 
Petrarch's  first  narrative,  written  before  he  realised 
any  need  for  apology,  we  gather  that  the  interview 
went  somewhat  as  follows:  The  Archbishop  couched 
his  request  in  the  most  flattering  terms  ;  he  whose 
lightest  word  was  usually  treated  as  a  command 
condescended  to  ask  for  Petrarch's  presence  in 
Milan  as  a  favour.  Petrarch  was  on  the  point  of 
objecting  that  he  was  pledged  to  work,  that  he 
hated  a  crowd  and  longed  for  quiet,  but  the  Arch- 
bishop anticipated  all  his  objections  and  answered 
them  before  they  were  made.  He  would  place  at 
his  disposal  a  healthy  house  in  a  delightful  part  of 
the  city,  with  the  church  of  St.  Ambrose  on  one 
side,  and  a  view  over  the  plain  to  the  Alps  on  the 
other  ;  could  the  country  offer  a  more  peaceful  re- 
treat ?  His  time  should  be  his  own,  he  should  be 
absolutely  his  own  master;  no  service  should  be 
expected  of  him,  no  obligation  imposed.  Petrarch 
yielded,  and  yielding  incurred  a  reproach  from 
which  his  warmest  partisans  cannot  wholly  clear 
him. 

The  news  brought  utter  dismay  to  some  of  his 
best  friends.  There  is  indeed  no  hint  of  disapproval 
from  Socrates;  to  that  loyal  and  affectionate  heart,  we 
may  suppose,  whatever  Petrarch  did  seemed  right. 
But  the  Florentines  could  not  possess  their  souls  in 
even  a  show  of  patience,  and  no  one  who  realises 
the  situation  can  refuse  them  his  sympathy.  A  good 
Florentine  could  not  help  hating  Milan,  and  no  better 


i8o     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Florentines  than  Boccaccio  and  Nelli  ever  breathed 
the  Tuscan  air.  It  was  not  merely  that  Florence 
and  Milan  happened  to  be  inveterate  enemies;  their 
antagonism  was  derived  not  from  a  mere  accident 
of  history,  but  from  a  conflict  of  principles.  What- 
ever the  faults  of  her  government,  the  great  Guelf 
Republic  stood  for  civic  liberty;  whatever  the  merits 
of  Milanese  order,  the  name  of  Milan's  rulers  sym- 
bolised tyranny.  In  going  to  live  with  the  "Great 
Viper,"  the  master  whom  they  revered  seemed  to 
them,  not  without  reason,  to  have  fallen  below  the 
most  elementary  standard  of  patriotism.  From 
Nelli  came  a  letter  of  remonstrance,  the  tenor  of 
which  can  be  pretty  accurately  inferred  from  Pet- 
rarch's reply.  Boccaccio  took  a  rod  from  the 
master's  own  cupboard ;  he  employed  Petrarch's 
favourite  device  of  allegory  and  in  a  pastoral 
dialogue  upbraided  "  Silvanus "  (as  Petrarch  often 
called  himself  in  compositions  of  this  kind)  for 
deserting  and  betraying  the  nymph  Amaryllis  (Italy) 
and  giving  himself  into  the  hands  of  her  oppressor, 
Egon  (the  Archbishop),  the  false  priest  of  Pan,  a 
monster  of  treachery  and  crime.  Petrarch  replied 
to  his  friends  in  letters  which  give  the  genuine 
explanation  of  his  conduct,  but  do  not  touch  the 
main  issue.  The  real  gist  of  the  remonstrance  is 
that  he,  the  Italian  patriot,  has  gone  over  to  the 
enemy's  camp.  He  replies  that  the  Archbishop  is 
a  very  powerful  and  very  courteous  prince,  that 
great  men's  commands  have  to  be  obeyed,  especi- 
ally when  they  take  the  form  of  entreaties,  and  that 
he  feared   to   incur  the  reproach  of  arrogance  by 


MILAN    AND   THE    VISCONTI      i8i 

refusing.  AH  this  is  quite  sincere:  he  had  a  delicate 
sensitiveness  which  made  it  very  difficult  for  him 
to  say  "  No"  to  those  who  went  out  of  their  way  to 
be  kind  to  him,  and  the  Archbishop  was  a  man  to 
whom  few  people  would  dare  to  refuse  anything  for 
which  he  condescended  to  ask.  He  meant  to  have 
the  World's  Laureate  as  an  ornament  to  his  Court, 
and  he  got  him.  By  sheer  strength  of  will  and 
suppleness  of  method  he  dominated  Petrarch  ;  but 
he  did  not  win  him,  as  Azzo  and  jacopo  had  won 
him,  by  the  heart,  even  though,  like  every  one  else, 
he  showed  him  only  the  best  side  of  his  nature.  The 
last  thing  a  man  could  do  with  Giovanni  Visconti 
was  to  love  him. 

One  consideration,  at  which  Petrarch  just  hints, 
may  have  had  legitimate  weight  with  him.  The 
Archbishop  offered  him  a  "healthy"  house;  with 
the  Great  Plag-ue  fresh  in  remembrance  that  was  an 
inducement  worth  thinking  about,  and  strangely 
enough  Milan  had  hitherto  entirely  escaped  the 
pestilence.  Petrarch  was  a  very  brave  man  ;  many 
a  time  we  have  seen  him  hazard  his  life  for  a  whim, 
and  go  unarmed  through  a  country  swarming  with 
brigands.  But  the  bravest  man  may  prefer  Goshen 
to  a  charnel-house,  and  having  no  special  duty  to 
combat  the  plague,  he  might  avoid  it  if  he  could. 

So  in  Milan  he  stayed  and  believed  himself  his 
own  master.  The  Visconti  kept  their  promise,  and 
put  no  constraint  upon  him.  They  knew  their  man ; 
he  would  have  wriggled  free  from  cliains,  but  the 
silken  bonds  of  courtesy  and  kindness  held  him  fast. 
If   he  attended  a   public  ceremony,   it   was   as  an 


i82      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

honoured  guest ;  if  he  represented  his  patrons 
abroad,  it  was  as  chief  spokesman  of  a  distinguished 
embassy.  The  close  scrutiny  of  his  friends'  eyes 
discerned  that  his  residence  in  Milan  was  derogatory 
to  his  highest  ideals,  but  it  must  be  acknowledged 
that  in  the  view  of  society  at  large  those  very 
ideals  were  exalted  by  the  exceeding  honour  done 
to  his  person. 

His  first  attendance  at  a  state  ceremonial  nearly 
cost  him  his  life  ;  he  rode  out  in  the  train  of  the 
Visconti  brothers  to  meet  the  new  papal  legate, 
Cardinal  Albornoz.  Night  was  falling  when  the 
Cardinal  arrived,  and  the  darkness  was  increased 
by  clouds  of  dust  from  the  two  cavalcades.  Pet- 
rarch rode  forward  in  his  turn  to  make  obeisance, 
and  was  resuming  his  place  when  something 
frightened  his  horse;  the  animal  jibbed  and  backed, 
and  dropped  his  hind-legs  over  the  precipitous  and 
ung-uarded  edsfe  of  the  road.  Petrarch  was  saved 
from  a  fall  that  would  probably  have  been  fatal  by 
the  promptitude  and  dexterity  of  young  Galeazzo 
Visconti.  The  horse  hung  on  by  his  fore-feet  only, 
and  Petrarch  fell  off  into  some  brambles,  which 
arrested  his  fall  for  a  moment,  and  just  gave  Gale- 
azzo time  to  grasp  him  by  the  hand  and  pull  him  up 
in  safety.  The  horse  too,  lightened  of  its  burden, 
managed  to  scramble  up.  Petrarch  might  well 
consider  that  he  owed  his  life  to  Galeazzo. 

A  few  weeks  later  he  attended  a  far  more  impos- 
ing if  somewhat  melancholy  ceremonial.  As  already 
mentioned,  the  crushing  defeat  of  the  Genoese  off 
the    mouth  of  the   Loiera   took   place   in   August, 


MILAN   AND   THE   VISCONTI      183 

Wounded  in  her  honour  by  the  flight  of  her  admiral, 
and  crippled  in  power  by  the  loss  of  more  than  half 
her  best  ships,  the  city  turned  upon  her  rulers,  and 
after  driving  them  from  power,  took  the  desperate 
course  of  seeking  help  from  Milan.  The  Arch- 
bishop's aid  was  to  be  had  only  on  his  own  terms  ; 
the  price  of  it  was  the  lordship  of  the  city.  Men 
scarcely  believed  their  ears  when  it  was  known  that 
the  Genoese  were  ready  to  pay  the  price.  Even 
Petrarch,  the  Archbishop's  honoured  guest  and 
counsellor,  was  shocked  for  a  moment  at  the  proud 
city's  humiliation.  But  the  shameful  bargain  was 
struck,  and  on  October  loth  the  Archbishop  re- 
ceived from  the  ambassadors  of  the  city  the  sub- 
mission of  Genoa.  He  made  them  a  dignified  and 
encouraging  reply  ;  he  had  got  what  he  wanted, 
and  was  not  the  man  to  grudge  stately  phrases. 
It  must  be  allowed  that  he  had  the  graces  of  ex- 
ternal deportment.  It  must  be  allowed  also  that  he 
did  not  neorlect  his  share  of  the  bargain.     He  made 

o  o 

serious  efforts  to  negotiate  an  honourable  peace 
with  Venice,  and  Petrarch  was  among  the  envoys 
entrusted  with  the  delicate  task.  The  victorious 
republic  rejected  his  overtures  with  contempt,  and 
a  year  later  suffered  in  her  turn  the  retribution  that 
waits  on  arrogance.  In  November,  1354,  the 
Genoese  admiral,  Paganino  Doria,  with  a  new  fleet, 
sailed  up  the  Adriatic,  and  surprised  and  utterly 
destroyed  the  naval  force  of  the  Venetians  at  Porto 
Lungo.  The  war  was  over,  and  it  was  Venice  who 
in  the  following  year  had  to  sue  for  peace.  The 
strategy  and  tactics  of  this  great  achievement  were 


i84     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Doria's,  but  men  noted  that  the  turning  point  in 
the  struora-le  had  been  the  intervention  of  Milan. 
It  seemed  as  though  Giovanni  Visconti  had  only  to 
put  his  hand  to  an  enterprise,  and  its  success  was 
assured.  But  by  a  strange  coincidence,  neither  he 
nor  the  great  Venetian  Doge,  Andrea  Dandolo, 
lived  to  see  the  issue  of  the  struggle  ;  Dandolo  died 
in  September,  and  Giovanni  Visconti  on  October  3rd. 

He  was  succeeded  in  his  sovereignties  by  his 
great -nephews  Matteo,  Bernabo,  and  Galeazzo, 
who  kept  the  territories  of  Milan  and  Genoa  as 
a  common  possession,  and  divided  the  rest  of  the 
inheritance.  Their  accession  was  made  the  occasion 
of  a  magnificent  ceremony,  at  which  Petrarch 
delivered  the  inevitable  harangue,  and  was  much 
disgusted  at  having  it  interrupted  in  the  middle  by 
an  astrologer,  who  declared  that  this  was  the  one 
propitious  moment  for  executing  the  deed  of  parti- 
tion. The  brothers  continued  to  him  the  full 
measure  of  their  great-uncle's  favour,  and  Bernabo 
shortly  afterwards  asked  him  to  stand  godfather  to 
his  infant  son  Marco.  The  endurino-  result  is  a 
birthday  poem  in  Latin  hexameters,  of  which  the 
first  few  lines  are  not  without  elegance,  but  which 
presently  degenerates  into  a  catalogue  of  the  in- 
credible number  of  persons  who,  unfortunately  for 
the  conscientious  student  of  Petrarch,  have  borne 
the  name  of  Marcus. 

A  rather  painful  incident  of  a  private  character 
has  to  be  noticed  as  belonging  to  this  period.  In 
1352  the  boy  Giovanni,  though  only  fifteen  years 
old,  had  been  appointed  to  a  canonry  at  Verona, 


THE   TOMn   OF   ANDREA    DAXIKJI.O,    WITH    IXSCRIPTIOX    |;v    I'KTRARCH 


MILAN   AND   THE   VISCONTI      185 

and  his  father  had  sent  him  from  Vaucluse  to  take 
possession  of  it,  commending  him  to  the  care  of  his 
old  schoolmaster  Rinaldo  and  of  Gulielmo  da  Past- 
rengo.  Now,  probably  owing  to  his  connection 
with  the  Visconti,  Petrarch  lost  the  favour  of  Can 
della  Scala,  Mastino's  heir ;  and  Giovanni,  who 
may  have  given  a  handle  to  his  enemies  by  some 
youthful  irregularity  of  conduct,  was  deprived  of  his 
benefice,  and  returned  to  live  with  his  father. 

The  year  which  brought  this  domestic  anxiety 
brought  also  a  notable  addition  to  Petrarch's  library. 
In  January,  1 354,  he  received  from  the  Greek  general, 
Nicholas  Sygerus,  who  was  equally  distinguished  as 
a  soldier  and  a  scholar,  a  manuscript  of  the  Homeric 
Poems  in  Greek,  probably  the  first  copy  of  Homer 
sent  from  East  to  West  since  the  severance  of  the 
Churches.  His  delight  in  the  possession  of  this 
treasure  furnishes  a  touching  illustration  of  his 
enthusiasm  for  the  classics.  "From  the  extremity 
of  Europe,"  he  writes,  "you  have  sent  me  a  present, 
the  worthiest  of  yourself,  the  most  acceptable  to  me, 
the  noblest  in  intrinsic  value  that  it  was  possible 

for  you   to   send What  gift    could  come 

more  appropriately  from  a  man  of  your  talent  and 
eloquence  than  the  very  fountain-head  of  all  talent 
and  eloquence  ?  So  you  have  given  me  Homer, 
whom  Ambrose  and  Macrobius  have  well  named 
the  fount  and  orioin  of  all  divine  imagrination.  .  .  . 
Your  gift  would  be  complete  indeed,  if  only  you  could 
give  me  your  own  presence  together  with  Homer's, 
so  that  under  your  guidance  I  might  enter  on  the 
strait  path  of  a  foreign  language,  and  enjoy  your 


i86      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

gift  in  the  happy  fulfilment  of  my  own  wish.  .  .  . 
Your  voice,  if  only  I  could  hear  it,  would  both 
excite  and  assuage  the  thirst  of  learning  that  pos- 
sesses me  ;  but  it  reaches  not  my  ears,  and  without 
it  your  Homer  is  dumb  to  me,  or  rather  I  am  deaf 
to  him.  Nevertheless,  I  rejoice  in  the  mere  sight 
of  him  ;  often  I  clasp  him  to  my  bosom  and  exclaim 
with  a  sigh,  *  Oh,  great  man!  How  do  I  long  to 
understand  thy  speech!'  .  .  .  Take  then  my  thanks 
for  your  exceeding  bounty.  Strange  to  say,  Plato, 
the  prince  of  the  philosophers,  was  already  in  my 
house,  sent  to  me  from  the  West.  .  .  .  Now 
through  your  generosity  the  Greek  prince  of  poets 
joins  the  prince  of  philosophers.  ...  If  there  is 
any  book  that  you  wish  to  have  from  me,  I  beg 
you  to  let  me  make  a  return  for  your  great  kind- 
ness ;  use  your  right  to  command  me.  For  I,  as 
you  see,  use  my  right  over  you ;  and  since  success 
in  begging  breeds  boldness  in  the  beggar,  send  me 
Hesiod,  if  your  leisure  allows,  send  me,  I  pray  you, 
Euripides." 


CHAPTER    XII 

CHARLES   IV   AND   PRAGUE 
1354-1357 

CHARLES  of  Luxemburg,  Prince  of  Bohemia, 
son  of  the  blind  King  John,  was  elected  King 
of  the  Romans  in  1346,  a  few  weeks  before  his 
father's  death  at  Crecy.  Strictly  speaking,  he  should 
have  borne  no  higher  title  previous  to  his  corona- 
tion, but  the  stringency  of  the  old  rule  had  become 
relaxed  by  courtesy,  and  we  find  him  constantly 
addressed  as  Emperor  from  the  first.  His  election 
was  the  result  of  a  papal  intrigue,  carried  out  dur- 
ing the  lifetime  of  his  predecessor  Lewis  "the 
Bavarian,"  who  had  been  deposed  and  excom- 
municated by  three  successive  Popes.  Naturally  it 
was  displeasing  to  those  who  considered  that  an 
Emperor's  main  function  should  be  to  annoy  the 
Pope.  Lewis  had  lived  up  to  this  simple  view  of 
his  duties  ;  he  had  even,  as  we  have  seen,  revived 
the  good  old  imperial  practice  of  setting  up  an 
Anti-Pope.  Charles  IV  was  the  Papacy's  effective 
rejoinder,  nearly  twenty  years  delayed,  but  the 
Papacy  could  afford  to  wait.  Militant  German 
imperialists  nicknamed  him  "the  Priests'  Kaiser," 
but  after  the  death  of  Lewis  in  1347  his  title  was 
generally  accepted. 

187 


i88     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Now,  if  ever,  the  White  Guelf  ideal  of  Pope  and 
Emperor  ruling  the  world  jointly  seemed  to  have 
its  chance.  Yet  it  was  not  even  seriously  tried.  It 
is  easy  for  us,  who  have  been  enlightened  by  the 
genius  of  Macchiavelli,  to  comprehend  the  failure  ; 
for  since  the  days  of  the  great  Florentine  it  has 
been  an  accepted  axiom  that  human  nature  is  the 
most  important  factor  in  politics.  The  White  Guelf 
theory  never  had  a  chance  precisely  because  of  its 
logical  perfection.  Admirable  as  an  embodiment 
of  ordered  thought  and  philosophic  synthesis,  it 
lacked  just  the  one  thing  needful,  in  that  it  made 
no  allowance  for  the  friction  of  human  passions. 
There  was  just  a  chance  that  Petrarch  might  see 
this.  He  had  broken  loose  from  the  methods  of 
the  schoolmen,  and  had  taken  the  classical  writers 
for  his  models.  If  you  had  said  to  him  that  systems 
were  useless  unless  you  could  get  suitable  men  to 
work  them,  he  would  have  accepted  the  statement 
without  demur,  and  would  have  quoted  you  a  dozen 
instances  of  the  fact  from  Livy,  and  as  many 
illustrations  of  the  principle  from  Cicero ;  in  the 
last  year  of  his  life  he  might  even  have  cited  his 
own  admirable  treatise  Concerning  the  Best  Methods 
of  Administering  a  State.  But  he  did  not  realise 
this  truth  in  practical  politics,  or  see  how  fatal  it 
must  be  to  his  hopes,  precisely  because  he  stood  too 
near  to  the  Middle  Ages,  and  his  own  life  too  closely 
resembled  the  lives  of  the  men  who  had  evolved 
the  theory. 

Not  that  he  was  its  bigoted  adherent.  As  we 
have  seen  in  considering  his  relations  with  Rienzi, 


CHARLES    IV   AND    PRAGUE      189 

the  sovereignty  of  Rome  was  to  him  the  supreme 
end  of  poHtics,  and  he  would  have  welcomed  any 
means  by  which  that  end  could  be  attained.  Per- 
sonally his  warmest  sympathies  were  with  a  revival 
of  the  Roman  Republic;  but  this  had  been  tried  and 
had  failed  ;  and  with  mingled  feelings  of  disillusion- 
ment and  hope  he  took  up  again  the  White  Guelf 
idea,  and  wrote  letter  after  letter  to  Charles  IV, 
urging  him  by  every  incentive  which  could  stimu- 
late his  ambition  or  rouse  his  conscience  to  come  to 
Italy  and  cherish  his  rightful  bride.  The  first  of 
these  letters  is  assigned  by  Fracassetti  to  February, 
1350,  but  contains  a  passage  which  makes  1351 
seem  the  more  probable  date.  At  the  latest,  it 
was  written  only  about  three  years  after  Rienzi's 
fall.  Frequently  during  the  intervening  years  there 
were  rumours  that  the  Emperor  was  coming  to 
Italy,  but  as  frequently  the  Emperor  put  off  the 
visit  with  what  seemed  to  Petrarch  frivolous  excuses. 
The  poet  spared  neither  rebuke  nor  reproach,  but 
the  Emperor  bore  him  no  grudge  for  his  plain 
speaking.  When  at  last  he  arrived  in  Italy,  he 
invited  him  to  spend  a  week  at  his  Court,  and  even 
sent  Sagramor  de  Pommieres,  an  officer  of  his  body- 
guard, to  escort  him  thither. 

Charles  had  come  to  Italy  with  the  full  assent  of 
the  Pope,  to  whom  he  had  promised  not  to  spend 
more  than  the  actual  day  of  his  coronation  in  Rome, 
and  to  respect  the  papal  sovereignty  over  the  States 
of  the  Church.  Early  in  November,  1354,  he 
arrived  in  Padua,  where  Jacopo's  sons  and  succes- 
sors  received   him    with    every  honour,    and   were 


I90      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

rewarded  with  the  title  of  Vicars  Imperial.  Then 
came  his  first  disillusionment :  Can  della  Scala  shut 
the  oates  of  Verona  against  him.  The  Visconti 
were  of  course  hostile,  for,  being  but  a  novice  in 
diplomacy,  he  had  made  no  secret  of  his  wish  to 
form  a  league  against  them.  He  went  to  Mantua, 
where  the  Gonzaga  received  him  well,  and  where 
he  expected  to  find  ambassadors  from  the  cities  of 
Tuscany.  Here  was  his  second  disappointment;  as 
the  Pope's  ally,  he  had  found  himself  unwelcome  to 
many  of  the  old  Ghibellin  families  ;  now  he  was 
to  learn  that  his  imperial  title  deprived  him  of  all 
countenance  from  the  Guelf  republics  ;  of  the 
Tuscan  states  only  Pisa,  pathetically  faithful  to 
her  traditions,  sent  envoys  to  welcome  once  more 
an  Emperor  to  Italy.  The  "  Priests'  Kaiser"  had 
fallen  between  two  stools.  But  Charles  was  no 
fool ;  he  could  listen  to  unpalatable  advice  and 
profit  by  experience ;  and  in  Italy  the  lessons  of 
statecraft,  if  learnt  at  all,  were  learnt  quickly. 
Charles  agreed  with  his  adversaries  while  he  was 
in  the  way  with  them.  He  no  longer  talked  of 
taming  the  Visconti's  insolence  ;  on  the  contrary,  he 
proposed  to  receive  the  Iron  Crown  of  Lombardy 
at  their  hands. 

Petrarch's  visit  must  have  been  useful  to  Charles 
in  this  change  of  front.  If  he  wanted  an  occasion 
for  opening  communications  with  Milan,  here  was 
one  which  could  be  either  kept  free  from  the  taint 
of  politics,  or  made  to  serve  as  an  introduction  to 
them.  The  visit  was  also  a  great  success  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  visitor.      He  travelled  through 


CHARLES    IV    AND    PRAGUE      191 

the  coldest  weather  in  livinor  memory,  but  the 
warmth  of  his  welcome  made  ample  amends. 
Charles  received  him  with  frank  courtesy,  and  to 
his  vast  delight  kept  him  talking  night  after  night 
into  the  small  hours.  Charles  asked  him  about  the 
Lives  of  Ilhist7'ious  Men.  Petrarch  seized  his  op- 
portunity, and  while  telling  him  that  it  was  not  yet 
ready  for  publication,  promised  to  dedicate  it  to  him 
if  his  actions  were  such  as  to  deserve  it,  and  if  he 
himself  were  spared  to  finish  it.  And  to  keep  him 
in  mind  of  the  great  men  whom  he  was  to  imitate, 
Petrarch  made  him  a  present  of  some  very  beautiful 
gold  and  silver  medals  of  the  Caesars,  among  which 
the  portrait  of  Augustus  especially  almost  seemed 
to  have  the  breath  of  life.  We  must  credit  Charles 
with  rare  magnanimity,  or  perhaps  it  were  juster  to 
say  we  must  credit  Petrarch  with  rare  charm,  when 
we  find  that  at  the  end  of  the  discourse  which 
accompanied  the  gift  the  Emperor  urged  his 
lecturer  to  go  with  him  to  Rome.  Petrarch's  ac- 
count of  the  visit,  written  in  a  letter  to  Laelius, 
leaves  us  with  the  impression  that  both  he  and 
Charles  must  have  had  an  insatiable  appetite  for 
talk. 

Presently  the  Emperor  moved  on  to  Milan  and 
became  the  Visconti's  guest.  This  was  not  a  happy 
visit ;  Galeazzo  excelled  in  the  art  of  polite  dis- 
courtesy, and  while  nothing  was  done  that  must 
necessarily  provoke  a  rupture,  nothing  was  omitted 
that  could  bring  home  to  the  Emperor  the  sense  of 
his  own  weakness  and  the  power  of  his  hosts.  On 
the  Feast  of  the  Epiphany,  1355,  Charles  received 


192      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

the  Iron  Crown  of  Lombardy,  not  at  Monza,  but  in 
the  church  of  St.  Ambrose  at  Milan.  When  he  left 
the  city,  Petrarch,  though  unable  to  accept  his  in- 
vitation to  go  to  Rome,  accompanied  him  as  far  as 
the  fifth  milestone  beyond  Piacenza.  He  went  on 
to  Pisa,  where  Laelius  waited  on  him  with  a  letter 
of  introduction  from  Petrarch,  and  so  to  Rome, 
where  he  received  the  imperial  crown  on  April  4th. 
He  returned  by  way  of  Pisa,  where  he  was  pleased, 
on  May  14th,  to  bestow  the  Laurel  Crown  of  Poetry 
on  Zanobi  da  Strada,  Niccolo  Acciaiuoli's  secretary, 
who  has  been  already  mentioned  as  a  friend  and 
frequent  correspondent  of  Petrarch.  The  meaning 
of  this  strange  freak  has  never  been  quite  clear. 
The  obvious  suggestion  is  that  it  must  have  been 
meant  as  a  snub  to  Petrarch,  perhaps  a  hint  that 
there  were  other  poets,  who  might  be  less  exigent 
in  the  matter  of  an  Emperor's  deeds  before  they 
praised  him ;  but  the  history  of  the  three  men's 
personal  relations  makes  against  this  easy  explana- 
tion. There  is  no  hint  of  anything  but  extreme 
cordiality  between  Charles  and  Petrarch,  and  only 
the  merest  conjecture  that  the  latter's  amicable 
relations  with  Zanobi  were  ever  interrupted.  Be- 
sides, Charles  was  not  a  fool  in  literature  any  more 
than  in  politics  ;  he  had  taste  and  judgment ;  and 
he  would  have  been  fully  alive  to  the  absurdity  of 
setting  up  this  painstaking  grammarian,  capable 
private  secretary,  and  respectable  writer  of  verse  as 
a  rival  to  Petrarch.  Such  folly  could  only  have 
emphasised  the  latter's  superiority  to  all  living 
poets.    Perhaps  the  explanation  may  be  simply  that 


CHARLES    IV   AND    PRAGUE      193 

the  Emperor  wanted  a  laureate  of  his  own  making, 
and  took  what  he  could  get.  From  Pisa  Charles 
made  his  way  northwards,  and,  to  Petrarch's  in- 
dignation, returned  to  Germany  in  June.  His 
Italian  tour  had  given  him  two  crowns,  and  rid 
him  of  a  few  illusions. 

During  the  whole  month  of  September  Petrarch 
suffered  from  an  unusually  violent  and  prolonged 
attack  of  the  tertian  fever,  to  which  he  was  always 
liable  at  that  season.  He  rose  from  his  bed  at  the 
beginning  of  October  so  weak  in  body  that  he  could 
hardly  hold  a  pen,  but  with  his  temper  exasperated 
afresh  against  the  physicians.  He  took  up  the  old 
feud  with  renewed  acrimony,  and  the  violent  Invec- 
tive against  a  Physician  is  the  unhappy  result.  It 
is  not  to  be  doubted  that  much  of  the  medicine  of 
that  day  was  mere  quackery,  and  a  calmly  reasoned 
exposure  of  the  knavery  of  many  practitioners  and 
the  folly  of  their  dupes,  put  forth  by  a  man  of  Pet- 
rarch's influence,  might  have  served  as  a  useful  aid 
in  the  promotion  of  serious  research ;  but  the  in- 
temperate vehemence  of  Petrarch's  invective,  though 
it  seems  to  have  commanded  Boccaccio's  admira- 
tion, could  only  defeat  its  own  object.  Not  only 
the  quacks  whom  he  was  justified  in  attacking,  but 
the  earnest  students  who  were  labouring  to  better 
the  rudimentary  science  of  their  time,  must  have 
been  set  against  the  man  who  thus  vilified  the 
whole  profession.  Yet  in  spite  of  this  furious  dia- 
tribe Petrarch  had  pleasant  relations  with  more 
than  one  physician  to  whom  he  was  personally 
known  ;  and  in  later  years  the  eminent  Dondi  dell' 
o 


194     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Orologio  enjoyed  his  intimate  friendship,  and 
possessed  the  precious  Virgil  after  his  death. 

Meanwhile  a  tragedy  had  happened  in  the  Vis- 
conti  family.  On  September  26th  Matteo,  the 
eldest  brother,  was  found  dead  in  his  bed.  That 
his  brothers  should  be  accused  of  poisoning  him 
was  only  natural ;  but  even  in  that  age  men  heard 
with  horror  that  the  bereaved  mother  was  the 
loudest  accuser  of  her  surviving  sons.  The  brothers 
denied  the  charge,  and  their  partisans  plausibly 
attributed  Matteo's  death  to  debauchery.  Their 
guilt  is  doubtful,  but  they  certainly  divided  the 
inheritance. 

About  this  time  the  whirligig  of  Italian  politics 
brought  Petrarch  a  new  friend.  For  two  years  the 
warrior-priest.  Cardinal  Albornoz,  had  been  fighting 
and  negotiating  as  the  Pope's  Legate  in  Italy,  and 
so  successful  had  he  been  alike  in  arms  and  in 
diplomacy,  that  he  had  brought  the  greater  part  of 
Romagna  and  the  March,  as  well  as  the  ancient 
States  of  the  Church,  either  into  direct  obedience  to 
the  Holy  See,  or  to  an  admission  of  its  overlord- 
ship.  Among  the  great  houses  reduced  to  obedience 
were  the  Malatesta  of  Rimini,  whom  the  Legate 
deprived  of  the  great  bulk  of  their  usurped  pos- 
sessions, while  allowing  them  to  retain  Rimini  itself 
and  three  other  cities,  as  vassals  of  the  Church. 
Their  diminished  possessions  hardly  gave  scope 
enough  to  the  more  ambitious  younger  members  of 
the  House,  and  Pandolfo  Malatesta,  who  was  at 
once  the  best  soldier  and  the  best  scholar  of  the 
family,    took    service   with    Galeazzo    Visconti    as 


CHARLES    IV   AND    PRAGUE      195 

general  of  his  cavalry.  Before  knowing  Petrarch 
personally,  he  had  conceived  so  great  an  admiration 
for  him,  that  he  commissioned  an  artist,  whose 
name  is  unknown  to  us,  to  paint  him  a  portrait  of 
the  poet.  The  picture  is  declared  by  Petrarch  to 
have  been  at  once  expensive  and  bad,  but  he  was 
undoubtedly  flattered  by  the  compliment  and  pre- 
disposed to  like  Pandolfo.  They  met  in  Milan,  and 
a  warm  and  lasting  friendship  resulted. 

But  clients  of  the  Visconti  could  not  hope  for 
the  continuous  enjoyment  of  each  other's  society. 
The  general  of  cavalry  in  particular  was  not  left 
long  in  idleness.  To  narrate  the  intrigues  of  these 
years  in  detail  would  require  a  good-sized  volume ; 
briefly,  it  may  be  said  that  leagues  against  the 
Visconti  were  perpetually  being  formed,  dissolved, 
and  formed  again.  In  the  winter  of  1355-6, 
Giovanni  Paleologo,  Marquis  of  Montferrat,  and 
Milano  Beccaria,  tyrant  of  Pavia,  both  of  them  once 
the  allies  and  now  the  opponents  of  the  Milanese 
Princes,  joined  in  organising  such  a  league.  The 
Marquis's  share  in  its  operations  was  to  excite  a 
rebellion  against  Galeazzo  in  Piedmont,  and  Pan- 
dolfo Malatesta  found  plenty  of  occupation  for  his 
sword  in  fighting  the  revolted  cities.  A  still  more 
serious  incident  connected  with  the  same  afTair  soon 
afterwards  took  Petrarch  on  a  distant  errand  of 
diplomacy.  It  was  more  than  suspected  that  the 
Emperor,  who  had  not  forgotten  the  humiliation 
inflicted  on  him  the  year  before,  was  secretly  sup- 
porting the  Visconti's  enemies,  and  still  more  alarm- 
ing rumours  were  current  of  a  proposed  invasion  of 


196     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Italy  by  the  allied  forces  of  Bohemia,  Hungary,  and 
Austria.  The  Visconti  had  no  mind  to  apologise 
for  the  past,  but  their  hands  were  full  enough  for 
the  moment,  and  partly  to  put  the  Emperor  in  good 
humour,  partly  to  spy  out  his  intentions,  they  dis- 
patched an  embassy  to  him,  with  Petrarch  as  its 
orator.  It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  practical 
business  of  the  embassy  was  entrusted  to  him  ;  he 
was  to  be  its  ornamental  figure-head,  and  we  can 
see  from  the  letter  in  which  he  tells  Nelli  of  his 
appointment  that  he  quite  grasped  the  situation. 
He  had  showered  reproaches  on  Charles  at  the 
time  of  his  departure  from  Italy ;  now  he  would 
catch  him  in  his  own  kingdom,  and  have  at  him 
again  for  his  ignoble  and  most  unimperial  flight. 
**  So,"  says  he,  "  whether  my  journey  be  for  any 
profit  or  no,  at  any  rate  I  shall  be  my  own  ambas- 
sador." To  tell  the  king  to  whom  you  are  accredited 
that  he  is  but  a  poor  creature  would  not  strike  a 
conventional  diplomatist  as  the  best  way  of  pro- 
pitiating him  ;  but  once  again  we  may  take  it  that 
the  Visconti  knew  their  men. 

Petrarch  set  out  on  May  20th,  and  again  enjoyed 
the  pleasure  of  having  Sagramor  de  Pommieres  for 
a  travelling  companion.  They  went  first  to  Bale, 
where  they  expected  to  find  the  Emperor,  but 
Charles  was  not  there,  and,  after  waiting  some 
weeks,  they  started  for  Prague.  They  had  left  just 
in  time.  Only  a  few  days  later  the  whole  basin  of 
the  Rhine  was  shaken  by  a  tremendous  earthquake. 
Over  eighty  castles  are  said  to  have  been  destroyed 
by  the  successive  shocks,   which  continued  at  in- 


CHARLES   IV  AND    PRAGUE      197 

tervals  for  many  months  ;  and  in  every  town  from 
Bale  to  Treves  houses  fell  and  the  citizens  had  to 
camp  in  the  fields.  The  first  shock,  which  Petrarch 
and  his  companions  just  escaped,  was  especially 
severe  at  Bale,  and  laid  almost  the  entire  city  in 
ruins. 

The  ambassadors  found  the  Emperor  in  Prague, 
and  Petrarch's  colleagues  must  have  noted  with 
satisfaction  that  his  hands  were  much  too  full  of 
German  business  to  permit  of  his  present  interven- 
tion in  Italy.  He,  whose  own  election  had  been 
secured  by  every  device  of  trickery,  was  busy  with 
his  famous  Golden  Bull — the  Reform  Bill  of  Imperial 
Elections.  Also,  however  unworthy  a  successor  he 
may  have  been  to  Augustus  in  politics,  he  was 
diligently  following  his  example  in  the  embellish- 
ment of  his  capital. 

We  have  no  details  of  this  visit  to  Prague.  We 
know  only  that  Petrarch  was  received  with  un- 
diminished cordiality  by  the  Emperor,  and  that  he 
spent  much  time  in  the  congenial  society  of  two 
great  ecclesiastics  of  the  Court,  Johann  Oczko, 
Bishop  of  Olmutz,  and  Ernest  von  Pardowitz, 
Archbishop  of  Prague.  Petrarch's  acquaintance 
with  these  two  distinguished  men,  begun  in  Italy, 
now  ripened  to  friendship,  and  many  of  his  later 
letters  are  addressed  to  them.  But  perhaps  the  best 
fruit  of  his  embassy  was  the  intimacy  with  Sagramor 
de  Pommieres,  which  resulted  from  their  companion- 
ship in  travel,  and  grew  so  close  that  a  year  or  two 
afterwards  he  could  speak  of  Sagramor  as  "privy 
to  his  every  thought  and  act."     The  visit  brought 


igS     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

him  also  the  dignity  of  Count  Palatine,  conferred 
on  him  by  the  Emperor  some  months  after  his 
departure,  and  later  still  the  honour  of  an  auto- 
graph letter  from  the  Empress  Anna,  informing  him 
that  she  had  been  safely  delivered  of  a  son. 

He  returned  to  Milan  at  the  beginning  of  Sep- 
tember, and  declared  to  Lselius  that  the  more  he 
travelled  abroad  the  more  he  loved  Italy. 

In  the  following  year  (1357)  occurred  an  incident, 
the  memory  of  which  Petrarch's  admirers  would 
willingly  let  die.  During  the  winter  events  had 
happened  at  Pavia  which  curiously  anticipated  by  a 
century  and  a  half  Savonarola's  celebrated  revolu- 
tion in  Florence.  An  eloquent  and  earnest  monk, 
named  Jacopo  Bussolari,  set  himself  to  combat  from 
the  pulpit  the  vices  and  bad  government  of  the 
Visconti.  So  far,  his  sermons  were  heard  without 
distaste  by  the  Beccaria,  but  their  attitude  changed 
when,  from  denunciation  of  the  Milanese  tyrants, 
Bussolari  proceeded  to  crusade  against  tyranny 
and  vice  in  general,  with  pointed  allusions  to  the 
occupants  of  the  adjoining  palace.  The  Beccaria 
tried  the  usual  tyrant's  answer  to  criticism ;  but  all 
their  plots  to  assassinate  Bussolari  were  discovered, 
and  the  successive  discoveries  raised  him  from  the 
position  of  a  popular  preacher  to  that  of  a  national 
prophet,  saint,  and  hero.  At  last  he  ended  a  sermon 
of  surpassing  eloquence  by  bidding  the  people 
organise  a  free  government  under  leaders  whom  he 
designated  by  name.  The  people  rose  as  one  man 
at  his  call,  and  a  republican  government  was  in- 
stalled under  the  eyes  of  the  Beccaria,  who  were 


CHARLES    IV   AND    PRAGUE      199 

expelled  one  by  one  from  the  liberated  city.  In 
desperation  they  turned  to  their  old  allies  and 
recent  foes,  the  Visconti,  surrendered  to  them  their 
fortified  country  houses,  and  organised  a  plot  to 
put  them  in  possession  of  the  city.  This  plot  also 
failed,  and  for  a  time  Pavia  enjoyed  the  blessings 
of  freedom.  Surely  this  was  a  movement  with 
which  he  who  applauded  Rienzi  should  have  sym- 
pathised. Alas !  Pavia  was  not  Rome,  and  the 
iron-willed  Visconti  held  Petrarch  in  a  grip  far 
stronger  than  that  of  the  House  of  Colonna.  At 
Galeazzo's  instigation,  he  managed  to  persuade 
himself  that  Bussolari  was  a  mere  adventurer,  a 
charlatan,  who  had  deluded  the  people  with  empty 
phrases,  that  he  might  use  them  as  his  instruments 
to  work  out  the  selfish  aims  of  unbridled  ambition. 
He  wrote  Bussolari  a  letter  of  insolent  reproof  and 
impertinent  exhortation,  which  we  can  hardly  read 
for  shame  and  would  gladly  delete  from  the  manu- 
scripts which  it  deforms.  Affection  for  Galeazzo, 
to  whom  he  considered  himself  indebted  for  his  life, 
is  the  one  admissible  palliation,  and  it  is  pitiably 
inadequate.  True,  that  liberty  in  the  fourteenth 
century  did  not  imply  democracy,  and  that  Petrarch 
would  conscientiously  have  pronounced  mob-rule 
the  worst  of  tyrannies.  Still  Bussolari  s  cause  was 
that  of  civil  liberty,  self-government,  and  moral 
purity ;  Galeazzo  stood  prominent,  the  champion 
of  a  tyranny  which  encouraged  every  vice.  Surely 
the  man  who  could  bid  Charles  live  up  to  the 
standard  of  Auoustus  micrht  have  used  his  influence 

o  o 

with  Galeazzo  to  soften,  if  he  could  not  turn  aside, 


200     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

his  wrath  against  Bussolari.  But  communication 
with  the  Visconti  had  corrupted  Petrarch's  manners; 
NelH  and  Boccaccio  were  justified  of  all  their  fears. 
Let  it  be  added,  however,  that  this  is  the  single 
instance  of  Petrarch's  degradation  ;  in  no  other  case 
did  he  accept  a  commission  from  the  Visconti  which 
he  could  not  honourably  fulfil. 


CHAPTER    XIII 

DOMESTICA 
1357-1360 

SO  far  as  regards  Petrarch's  connection  with 
public  affairs,  the  years  to  be  deah  with  in  this 
chapter  are  the  least  eventful  of  his  life.  But  they 
are  notable  for  some  interesting  personal  experi- 
ences, and,  above  all,  as  the  period  at  which  the 
poet  himself  took  a  review  of  his  past  life  and  work. 
They  offer,  therefore,  an  admirable  occasion  for 
a  similar  review  by  his  biographer,  and  an  attempt 
will  be  made  in  the  following  chapter  to  take  advan- 
tage of  the  opportunity. 

First,  however,  we  must  notice  the  few  domestic 
events  which  belong  to  the  period. 

One  of  these  shows  Petrarch  at  his  very  best. 
A  most  distressing  thing  had  happened  in  the  circle 
of  his  friends.  After  all  these  years  of  unbroken 
affection,  Socrates  and  Laslius  had  quarrelled;  worst 
of  all,  they  had  quarrelled  about  Petrarch.  Some 
slanderous  liar  had  told  Lselius  that  Socrates  had 
represented  him  as  opposing  Petrarch's  interests  at 
Avignon.  Loelius  was  furious,  Socrates  heart- 
broken, Petrarch  in  a  state  of  mind  which  without 
hyperbole  he  describes  as  agony.  The  moment  he 
heard  of  the  miserable  business,  he  sat  down  and 

201 


202      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

wrote  Leelius  a  long,  impetuous  letter  of  loving 
remonstrance  with  him  for  having  believed  the  lie, 
and  of  most  loving  entreaty  that  he  would  believe 
the  truth  now  and  make  it  up  with  Socrates.  He 
was  your  friend,  says  Petrarch,  even  before  he  was 
mine.  We  have  lived  eight-and-twenty  years  to- 
gether, the  three  of  us,  in  the  closest  union  of  souls. 
You  know  him  incapable  of  such  baseness ;  how  could 
you  believe  it  of  him  for  a  moment  ?  You  should 
have  thrust  the  calumny  from  you,  as  Alexander 
did  when  his  friend  and  physician  was  accused  of 
being  bribed  to  poison  him,  and  he  drank  off  the 
draught  before  showing  the  accusation  to  his  friend. 
"  Friendship  is  a  great,  a  divine  thing,"  he  goes  on, 
"and  quite  simple.  It  requires  much  deliberation, 
but  once  only  and  once  for  all.  You  must  choose 
your  friend  before  you  begin  to  love  him  ;  once  you 
have  chosen  him,  to  love  him  is  your  only  course. 
When  once  you  have  had  pleasure  in  your  friend, 
the  time  to  measure  him  is  past.  'Tis  an  old  pro- 
verb that  bids  us  not  to  be  doing  what  is  done 
already.  Thenceforward  there  is  no  room  for  sus- 
picion or  quarrel ;  there  remains  to  us  but  this  one 
thing — to  love."  Compare  with  this  admirable 
passage  the  equally  beautiful  sentence  in  a  letter  to 
Nelli,  written  a  few  years  earlier:  " In  my  friendships 
I  practise  no  art,  except  to  love  utterly,  to  trust  utterly, 
to  feign  nothing,  to  hide  nothing,  and,  in  a  word,  to 
pour  out  everything  into  my  friends'  ears,  just  as  it 
comes  from  my  heart."  Petrarch's  pleading  was 
irresistible,  and  to  his  delight  he  heard  before  long 
that  Lselius  had  no  sooner  read  his  letter,  than  he 


DOMESTICA  203 

had  gone  straight  with  it  to  Socrates,  and  with 
tears  and  embraces  they  had  knit  afresh  the  ancient 
bonds  of  affection.  The  friend  who  had  brought 
them  together  was  as  happy  in  their  reconciliation 
as  he  had  been  miserable  at  their  estrangement. 
"  All  your  life  you  have  done  me  pleasure  on  plea- 
sure," he  wrote  to  Laelius,  "but  never  a  keener 
pleasure  than  this." 

This  was  by  no  means  the  only  time  in  his  life 
that  Petrarch  played  the  part  of  peacemaker  among 
his  friends.  We  find  him,  for  instance,  doing  the 
same  office  for  Nicol5  Acciaiuoli  and  Barili,  and 
with  equal  success ;  but  the  matter  never  went  so 
near  his  heart  as  in  this  quarrel  between  Laelius 
and  Socrates.  ''Till  this  day,"  he  wrote  in  this 
letter  to  Laelius,  "  we  had  lived  together  not  merely 
in  harmony,  but,  as  one  might  say,  with  only  one 
mind  in  the  three  of  us."  And  nothing  can  be 
more  charming  or  more  touching  than  the  grace 
with  which  in  the  letter  of  congratulation  he  gives 
Laelius  all  the  credit  for  his  prompt  act  of  reconcilia- 
tion, and  is  satisfied  for  his  own  part  with  the  pure 
delight  of  his  friends'  reunion.  Whatever  may  have 
been  his  qualities  or  his  defects  as  an  Ambassador 
of  State,  the  world  has  not  seen  his  superior  in  the 
delicate  diplomacies  of  friendship. 

In  the  congratulatory  letter  to  Laelius,  there  is 
a  passage  which  makes  it  clear  that  once  again 
Petrarch's  friends  at  the  Papal  Court  had  proposed 
to  get  him  the  offer  of  the  papal  secretaryship,  and 
once  more  he  had  been  able  to  defeat  their  well- 
meant    intentions,    this    time   without    mystery    or 


204     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

secret  machination.  He  was  less  than  ever  inclined 
for  the  office.  He  had  fewer  friends  among  the 
Cardinals  than  of  old,  and  Pope  Innocent,  as  we 
have  seen,  had  been  violently  prepossessed  against 
him  at  the  beginning  of  his  reign.  That  temper, 
indeed,  must  have  changed  already,  or  Lselius  and 
the  rest  could  not  have  dreamt  of  getting  the 
appointment  for  Petrarch.  Still,  Innocent  was  not 
his  friend  as  Clement  had  been,  and  he  says  himself 
that  his  position  at  the  Curia  was  very  different 
now  from  what  it  had  been  a  dozen  years  before. 
The  post  was  given  to  Zanobi  da  Strada,  at  whose 
promotion  Petrarch  sincerely  rejoiced,  reckoning  that 
he  had  now  a  new  friend  in  Avignon,  and  regretting 
only  that  Zanobi  would  have  no  more  time  for 
poetry.  The  language  of  this  passage  sufficiently 
refutes  the  absurd  calumny,  for  which  there  is  not 
a  scrap  of  first-hand  evidence,  that  Petrarch  was 
jealous  of  Zanobi. 

To  avoid  the  tediousness  of  perpetually  recurring 
to  the  subject  of  the  papal  secretaryship,  it  may  be 
mentioned  here  that  Pope  Innocent's  old  hostility 
to  Petrarch  presently  changed  into  so  cordial  a  feel- 
ing towards  him,  that  in  the  last  year  of  his  pontifi- 
cate he  made  him  a  direct  and  formal  offer  of  the 
post,  and  that  a  year  later  his  successor,  Urban  V, 
repeated  the  offer.  Petrarch  was  still  resolute  in 
declining,  but  none  the  less  the  incident  of  1361 
shows  both  men  in  an  agreeable  light.  The  Pope 
who  could  thus  revise  his  own  judgments  must 
have  possessed  a  sense  of  justice  rare  among  bigots, 
and    there  must   have    been  something   singularly 


INNOCENTWS 

ti^Lemouicen ,  creai 
i^Sx.Sedit  ami. a. 
ijt  die  i±.Sejyt.an. 


yi.  Stephaniis  Alhev 
die  is.Decemhaji. 
mejis.  8 .  dies  n  6M 
h63.y^.S.in.i,d,is. 


INNOCENT   VI 

FliO.M    A    rOKTRAIT   IN    THE    UKll  ISH    MUSEUM 


DOMESTICA  205 

attractive  about  the  man  in  whose  favour  such  judg- 
ments could  be  reversed. 

In  the  early  autumn  of  1358  he  suffered  an  acci- 
dent which  may  be  narrated  in  his  own  words. 
"You  shall  hear,"  he  writes  to  a  friend,  "what 
a  trick  Cicero,  the  man  whom  I  have  loved  and 
worshipped  from  my  boyhood,  has  just  played  me. 
I  possess  a  huge  volume  of  his  Letters,  which  I 
wrote  out  some  time  ago  with  my  own  hand  because 
there  was  no  original  manuscript  accessible  to  the 
copyists.  Ill-health  hindered  me,  but  my  great  love 
of  Cicero,  and  delight  in  the  Letters,  and  eager- 
ness to  possess  them,  prevailed  against  my  bodily 
weakness  and  the  laboriousness  of  the  work.  This 
is  the  book  which  you  have  seen  leaning  against 
the  door-post  at  the  entry  to  my  library.  One  day, 
while  going  into  the  room  thinking  about  some- 
thing else,  as  I  often  do,  I  happened  inadvertently 
to  catch  the  book  in  the  fringe  of  my  gown.  In 
its  fall  it  struck  me  lightly  on  the  left  leg  a  little 
above  the  heel.  'What!  my  Cicero,'  quoth  I, 
bantering  him,  '  pray  what  are  you  hitting  me  for  ? ' 
He  said  nothing.  But  next  day,  as  I  came  again 
the  same  way,  he  hit  me  again,  and  again  I  laughed 
at  him  and  set  him  up  in  his  place.  Why  make 
a  long  story  ?  Over  and  over  again  I  went  on 
suffering-  the  same  hurt :  and  thinkinor  he  might  be 
cross  at  having  to  stand  on  the  ground,  I  put  him 
up  a  shelf  higher,  but  not  till  after  the  repeated 
blows  on  the  same  spot  had  broken  the  skin,  and 
a  far  from  despicable  sore  had  resulted.  I  despised 
it  though,  reckoning  the   cause  of  my  accident  of 


2o6     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

much  more  weight  than  the  accident  itself.  So  I 
neither  gave  up  my  bath,  nor  put  any  restraint  on 
myself  in  the  matter  of  riding  and  walking,  but  just 
waited  for  the  thing  to  heal.  Little  by  little,  as 
if  hurt  at  my  neglect  of  it,  the  wound  swelled  up, 
and  presently  a  patch  of  flesh  came  up,  discoloured 
and  angry.  At  last,  when  the  pain  was  too  much 
not  only  for  my  wit,  but  for  sleep  and  rest,  so  that 
to  neglect  the  thing  any  longer  seemed  not  courage 
but  madness,  I  was  forced  to  call  in  the  doctors, 
who  have  now  for  some  days  been  fussing  over  this 
really  ridiculous  wound,  not  without  great  pain  and 
some  danger  to  the  wounded  limb,  as  they  insist, 
though  I  think  you  know  just  what  reliance  I  place 
on  their  prognostications  either  of  good  or  evil. 
At  the  same  time  I  am  bothered  with  constant 
fomentations,  and  am  cut  off  my  usual  food,  and 
obliged  to  keep  still,  to  which  I  am  quite  un- 
accustomed. I  hate  the  whole  business,  and  especi- 
ally I  hate  being  obliged  to  eat  sumptuous  fare. 
But  health  is  now  in  sight,  and  you  may  hear  of  me, 
as  I  have  of  you,  that  I  am  well  again,  before 
knowing  anything  of  my  having  been  ill.  ...  So 
this  is  how  my  beloved  Cicero  has  treated  me ;  he 
long  ago  struck  my  heart,  and  now  he  has  struck 
my  leg." 

Before  the  wound  was  fully  healed,  two  days  in  fact 
before  the  above  letter  was  written,  he  paid  a  visit 
which  is  notable  as  showing  how  enthusiasm  for  the 
revival  of  learning  was  spreading  through  different 
classes  of  Italian  society  ;  it  also  illustrates  the  lines 
of  social  cleavage  in  fourteenth-century  Italy. 


DOMESTICA  207 

There  lived  at  Bergamo  a  goldsmith  named 
Enrico  Capra,  an  old  man  who  had  grown  rich  by- 
skill  in  his  handicraft,  for  he  was  a  working  smith, 
and  not  to  be  confounded  with  the  banker  g-old- 
smiths  of  Florence  or  Genoa.  As  a  young  man 
he  was  little  versed  in  letters,  but  had  always  a 
natural  inclination  to  them.  Late  in  life  he  heard 
of  Petrarch's  reputation  as  a  scholar  ;  his  imagina- 
tion was  kindled,  and  he  resolved  to  give  up  every- 
thing for  study.  Petrarch  was  his  hero.  His 
highest  ambition  was  now  to  be  a  humble  scholar 
in  the  studies  of  which  Petrarch  was  the  master. 
He  consulted  his  idol,  and  Petrarch,  with  that 
practical  good  sense  which  is  so  disconcerting  to 
people  who  would  like  to  put  poets  and  sensible 
men  into  separate  pigeon-holes,  advised  him  strongly 
to  stick  to  his  trade.  "  For,"  said  he,  "  it  is  late  for 
you  to  strike  out  an  entirely  new  line,  and  your 
private  affairs  may  suffer."  In  this  one  thing,  Capra 
was  deaf  to  his  hero's  advice.  He  gave  up  his 
business  and  set  himself  to  school.  One  supreme 
desire  now  possessed  him,  to  have  the  honour  of 
entertaining  Petrarch  as  his  guest,  if  it  were  but  for 
a  single  night.  Petrarch's  fashionable  friends  would 
have  dissuaded  him  from  the  visit,  representing 
that  it  was  beneath  his  dignity  to  be  a  tradesman's 
guest.  He  knew  better,  and  was  too  much  a 
gentleman  to  be  ruled  by  them.  He  has  often  been 
accused  of  courting  great  men,  and  it  is  perfectly 
true  that  he  did  like  to  sit  on  the  rieht  hand  of 
princes.  But  what  he  liked  in  it  was  the  feeling 
that  he  had  power  to  influence  the  powerful.     He 


2o8     PETRARCH   AND    HIS   TIMES 

was  no  vulgar  devotee  of  mere  riches  or  mere  rank. 
He  would  have  been  worse  than  a  barbarian,  worse 
than  a  wild  beast,  he  declares,  if  he  had  refused 
Capra's  request.  The  man  carried  the  fervency  of 
his  desire  writ  plain  in  eyes  and  brow.  So  to  Ber- 
gamo he  went,  and  with  him  rode  some  of  his  fine 
friends,  curious  to  see  how  the  goldsmith  would 
deport  himself.  The  goldsmith  was  above  every- 
thing anxious  that  Petrarch  should  not  be  bored  ; 
he  abounded  in  conversation,  and  the  fine  gentle- 
men had  to  acknowledge  that  the  excellence  of  their 
entertainment  made  the  way  seem  short.  When 
they  reached  Bergamo  it  seemed  as  if  the  whole 
town  had  turned  out  to  receive  Petrarch.  There 
were  the  governor,  the  captain  of  the  militia,  and 
all  the  city  dignitaries,  pressing  on  him  a  public 
reception  at  the  palace  and  entertainment  at  the 
house  of  one  of  the  chief  men.  Again  Capra 
trembled  with  apprehension,  but  Petrarch  knew 
what  good  manners  and  good  feeling  required  of 
him.  He  was  the  goldsmith's  guest,  and  with  civil 
excuses  to  the  great  folks  he  went  to  the  gold- 
smith's house.  There  he  found  such  entertainment 
as  Prague  itself  had  not  provided  for  him.  He 
dined  off  gold  plate,  and  slept  in  a  bed  hung  with 
imperial  purple,  in  which,  vowed  his  host,  no  other 
man  had  ever  slept,  or  ever  should.  There  were 
plenty  of  books  too,  "not  a  mechanician's  books, 
but  those  of  a  student  and  a  most  zealous  lover  of 
letters."  Petrarch  might  have  stayed  more  than 
one  night  if  he  could  have  been  left  alone  with  his 
delighted  host,  but  he  ran  away  from  the  otherwise 


DOMESTICA  209 

inevitable  civic  festivities.  The  o^overnor  and  the 
town  councillors,  unable  to  keep  him  as  a  guest,  ac- 
companied him  a  great  part  of  the  way  home,  but 
it  is  pleasant  to  know  that  they  were  outridden  by 
Enrico  Capra,  who  saw  his  hero  safe  to  the  very 
threshold  of  his  home. 

Petrarch  spent  a  good  part  of  the  winter  at 
Padua,  where  he  had  business  to  transact,  and  at 
Venice,  where  he  stayed  for  pleasure  ;  and  in  the 
spring  of  1359  he  enjoyed  the  exquisite  pleasure 
of  a  visit  from  Boccaccio.  We  feel  a  kind  of  pride 
in  human  nature  when  we  see  how  completely  their 
difference  of  opinion  about  Petrarch's  residence  in 
Milan  had  failed  to  impair  their  friendship.  Sil- 
vanus  cannot  have  enjoyed  being  told  that  his 
new  friend  Egon  was  a  blood-thirsty  renegade  ; 
but  Nelli  and  Boccaccio  might  say  to  him  what 
they  liked.  To  them  he  had  given  his  heart,  and 
he  lived  up  to  his  own  fine  sentiment,  that  when 
once  you  have  given  your  heart,  there  is  nothing 
left  for  you  but  to  love.  Moreover,  he  held  that 
there  should  be  no  concealments  between  friends  ; 
it  was  Boccaccio's  duty,  then,  to  show  him  all  that 
was  in  his  heart.  Boccaccio's  attitude  seems  to 
have  been  equally  pleasing.  He  did  not  retract 
his  opinion,  but  he  had  had  his  say,  and  the  decision 
did  not  lie  with  him.  His  relations  with  Petrarch 
illustrate  the  modesty  of  which  genius  may  be 
capable  :  he  constantly  insisted  on  taking  the  place 
of  a  disciple  ;  and  he  would  not  be  fatuous  enough 
to  suppose  that  the  master  must  always  see  eye  to 
eye  with  him.     So  this  loyal  Florentine  made  his 


2IO     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

pilgrimage  to  the  city  which  he  hated  and  the  friend 
whom  he  loved.  There  had  been  a  constant  inter- 
change of  letters  and  poems  between  them  since 
their  last  meeting.  Boccaccio  had  sent  on  one 
occasion  St.  Augustine's  Commentary  on  the  Psalms, 
on  another  some  works  of  Cicero  and  Varro  copied 
with  his  own  hand  for  his  friend's  library.  Then 
we  find  Petrarch  acknowledging  the  receipt  of 
several  letters,  and  alluding  to  one  of  his  own  which 
had  been  lost  in  transmission.  And  Boccaccio 
having  protested  against  being  called  a  poet,  Pet- 
rarch rallies  him  on  his  petulance.  "A  strange 
thing,"  he  says,  "that  you  should  have  aimed  at 
being  a  poet  only  to  shrink  from  the  name."  And 
from  what  follows,  we  may  gather  that  Boccaccio 
felt  legitimately  aggrieved  that  his  poetical  work 
had  not  won  him  the  recocrnition  of  the  laurel.     We 

o 

gather  too  that  the  Milanese  visit  was  a  project 
of  long  standing.  At  last  in  the  early  spring  of 
1359  it  was  realised,  and  Petrarch  writes  to  Nelli : 
"  I  should  send  you  a  longer  letter,  but  that  I  am 
prevented  by  a  want  of  time  which  is  of  my  own 
making,  to  wit,  through  the  most  delightful  com- 
panionship of  our  common  friend,  to  whose  visit 
there  are  only  two  drawbacks — the  shortness  of  it 
and  your  absence.  The  pleasant  days  have  slipped 
away  silently  and  unperceived.  But  our  friend's 
own  voice  will  tell  you  what  my  pen  has  no  time 
for ;  you  can  trust  implicitly  in  his  report,  for  he 
knows  perfectly  my  every  thought,  my  every  action, 
my  manner  of  life,  in  a  word  my  whole  self,  and  all 
my  little  haps  and  hopes," 


DOMESTICA  211 

Boccaccio  left  about  the  end  of  March  in  wild 
weather,  but  reached  Florence  without  accident. 
Soon  afterwards  he  sent  Petrarch  a  copy  of  the 
Divina  Co77iniedia,  together  with  a  poetical  Latin 
letter,  in  which  he  begged  "  Italy's  glory  and  his 
own  dear  friend  and  single  hope  "  to  accept,  read, 
and  admire  the  great  work  of  the  poet-cxilc,  who 
first  showed  the  world  of  what  achievements  in 
verse  his  mother-tongue  was  capable ;  his  brow 
deserved  the  laurel  which  it  failed  to  obtain ; 
Florence,  the  great  mother  of  poets,  bore  him  and 
takes  her  place  of  pride  among  cities  under  the 
championship  of  his  glorious  name  ;  in  honouring 
him,  his  brother-poets  do  honour  to  themselves  and 
their  craft.  In  this  last  sentiment,  or  in  the  exhorta- 
tion to  read  Dante,  Petrarch  may  have  seen  ever 
so  delicate  a  hint  of  the  common  belief  that  he  was 
jealous  of  the  latter's  fame,  though  Boccaccio  had 
spared  no  possible  words  of  compliment  to  himself. 
His  answer  is  quite  candid,  and  gives  a  faithful 
picture  of  his  sentiments.  The  supposition  that  he 
was  jealous  of  the  elder  poet's  fame  rests  on  a  far 
different  basis  from  the  silly  gossip  that  he  envied 
Zanobi.  "Jealousy"  of  Dante  is  not,  indeed,  the 
right  word,  but  want  of  appreciation  must  be 
admitted.  He  is  quite  sincere  in  saying  to  Boc- 
caccio that  "Dante  easily  carries  off  the  palm  among 
writers  in  Italian,"  and  this  is  not  the  language  of 
jealousy;  nor  is  his  protestation  that  he  "admires 
and  venerates "  Dante  less  sincere.  But  the  pith 
of  the  whole  matter  lies  in  that  passage  of  uncon- 
scious self-revelation,   where  he  protests   that   his 


212     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

admiration  of  the  great  Florentine,  as  of  every  one 
else,  is  critical,  and  really  implies  a  much  higher 
compliment  to  its  object  than  the  indiscriminate 
gush  with  which  his  ignorant  worshippers  bedaub 
their  idol.  Exactly ;  Petrarch  admired  Dante 
"  critically,"  but  he  read  him  very  little,  and  radical 
difference  of  temperament  made  it  impossible  that 
he  should  be  in  sympathy  with  him. 

The  autumn  of  1359  brought  a  very  sad  incident 
in  Petrarch's  domestic  life.  For  years  Giovanni's 
character  and  conduct  had  been  a  source  of  painful 
anxiety  to  his  father.  At  last  the  young  man's 
faults  of  temper,  aggravated  by  the  elder's  faults  of 
management,  resulted  in  an  open  breach.  We 
have  only  Petrarch's  side  of  the  story,  and  not  very 
much  of  that,  but  it  is  enough  to  show  us  quite 
clearly  the  cause  and  the  nature  of  his  unhappy 
relations  with  his  son.  He  was  a  man  predisposed 
to  affection,  predisposed  also  to  count  his  geese 
swans.  He  was  the  last  man  in  the  world  to  belittle 
the  virtues  or  exa^orerate  the  sins  of  those  who 
belonged  to  him.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the 
lad  was  slothful,  sullen,  and  prone  to  a  disorderly 
life.  Only  by  very  judicious  handling  could  his 
better  qualities,  of  which  Petrarch's  friends  dis- 
cerned the  rudiments,  have  a  chance  to  win  the  day. 
Judicious  handling  was  exactly  what  Petrarch  could 
not  crive  him.  Sarcasm  and  sermonising-  are  the 
very  worst  tools  for  fashioning  the  character  of  such 
a  boy,  and  Petrarch,  honestly  anxious  to  shame 
Giovanni  into  industry  and  instil  into  him  a  virtuous 
ambition,  was  at  once  sarcastic  and  didactic.     The 


DOMESTICA  213 

circumstances  of  their  relationship  probably  aggrav- 
ated the  evil.  Petrarch,  as  we  have  seen,  had 
procured  letters  of  legitimacy  for  Giovanni,  which 
of  course  involved  an  admission  of  paternity,  and 
his  friends  knew  the  whole  story.  But  the  word 
"son"  was  seldom  if  ever  used  in  the  intercourse 
of  daily  life,  and  though  Nelli,  to  whom  the  lad 
paid  an  apparently  happy  visit  at  Avignon  in  1358, 
spoke  of  him  as  Giovanni  Petrarca,  his  position 
was  one  which  only  devoted  love  and  tactful  sym- 
pathy could  have  rendered  tolerable.  Now,  in  these 
years,  Petrarch,  sick  of  town  life,  had  found  himself 
a  retreat  entirely  to  his  mind,  which  he  called 
Liternum  after  Scipio's  famous  Campanian  villa, 
a  few  miles  outside  the  city  walls.  While  he  was 
living  there  a  robbery  occurred  in  his  house  at 
Milan,  which  was  traced  to  members  of  his  own 
household.  Coincidently,  Giovanni  was  guilty  of 
misconduct  so  grave  that  Petrarch  expelled  him 
from  his  house.  This  is  all  that  can  be  said  with 
certainty,  but  we  may  surely  infer  that  Giovanni 
was  found  to  be  a  participator  in  the  robbery,  if  not 


Its  mstigator. 


It  may  have  been  this  unhappy  occurrence  which 
finally  determined  Petrarch  to  give  up  his  house  in 
Milan,  and  transfer  himself  and  his  possessions  to 
the  Benedictine  monastery  of  San  Simpliciano, 
where,  though  only  just  outside  the  city,  he  could 
enjoy  all  the  pleasures  of  life  in  the  country,  and 
where  his  precious  books  would,  in  his  absence,  be 
under  the  guardianship  of  the  brothers.  He  chose 
his  rooms  with  judgment.     They  contained  a  con- 


214      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

venience  which  had  been  wanting  in  his  town  house 
— a  little  secret  door  which  he  could  use  as  a  bolt- 
hole  to  escape  from  unwelcome  visitors.  Here  he 
settled  on  November  3rd,  and  here  in  the  following 
August  he  received  a  visit  from  Niccol5  Acciaiuoli, 
with  whom,  as  we  have  seen,  he  had  long  been  in 
friendly  communication,  but  whom  he  appears  never 
to  have  met  till  now.  The  Grand  Seneschal  was 
an  expert  in  ceremonial ;  Matteo  Villani  even  hints 
that  he  carried  ostentation  to  a  fault ;  and  nothing 
was  omitted  that  stately  pomp  and  gracious  dignity 
could  contribute  to  mark  the  homage  which  he  paid 
to  Petrarch's  genius.  But  the  pleasantest  touch  in 
the  visit  was  the  eagerness  with  which  he  pounced 
on  the  poet's  books,  and  his  unwillingness  to  tear 
himself  away  from  them. 


THF.    TOMH    f)I-    \UC01.0   ACCIAIUOI.I 


CHAPTER   XIV 

THE   FOUNDER   OF   HUMANISM- 
PETRARCH'S   WORK   AND    ITS    RESULT 

IT  was  in  1359  that  Petrarch  faced  that  worst 
ordeal  of  a  writer's  Hfe,  the  revision  of  his 
papers.  The  letter  to  Socrates,  which  serves  as 
preface  to  the  collection  of  Fa^niliar  Letters,  shows 
him  in  a  retrospective  mood  of  rather  melancholy 
sentiment.  "We  have  tried  wellnigh  all  things, 
my  brother,  and  nowhere  is  rest.  When  are  we  to 
look  for  it  ?  Where  to  seek  it  1  Time,  as  the  say- 
ing goes,  has  slipped  through  our  fingers.  Our  old 
hopes  lie  buried  in  the  graves  of  our  friends.  It 
was  the  year  1348  that  made  us  lonely  men  and 
poor ;  for  it  took  away  from  us  treasures  which  not 
the  Indian  or  the  Caspian  or  the  Carparthian  Sea 
can  restore.  .  .  .  Now  what  thought  you  are  taking 
for  yourself,  my  brother,  I  know  not  ;  for  my  part, 
I  am  just  making  up  my  bundles,  and,  as  men  do 
on  the  eve  of  a  journey,  am  looking  out  what  to 
take  with  me,  what  to  share  among  my  friends,  and 
what  to  throw  into  the  fire  ;  for  I  have  nothing  to 
sell."  So  he  dived  into  the  rusty  chests,  and  pre- 
sently found  himself  "  ringed  round  with  heaped 
piles  of  letters,  blockaded  by  a  shapeless  mass  of 
paper."     His  first  impulse  was  to  save  bother  by 

215 


2i6     PETRARCH   AND    HIS   TIMES 

throwinof  the  lot  into  the  fire  ;  and  after  a  little 
indulgence  in  the  pathos  of  retrospect,  he  began 
the  work  of  destruction.  "A  thousand  or  more 
compositions,  some  of  them  stray  poems  of  every 
kind,  the  rest  familiar  letters,  were  thus  given  over 
to  Vulcan's  revision,  not  without  a  sigh  indeed,  for 
why  should  I  be  ashamed  to  own  my  weakness  ?  " 
While  these  were  burning,  he  bethought  him  of 
another  bundle  lying  in  a  corner,  and  containing 
letters  many  of  which  had  already  been  transcribed 
by  friends.  These  he  thought  would  give  little  or 
no  trouble,  so  he  spared  them,  and  in  fulfilment  of 
an  old  promise  resolved  to  dedicate  the  prose  to 
Socrates,  the  verse  to  Barbato.  Here  one  might 
well  suppose  the  story  of  the  EpistolcE  de  Rebus 
Familiaribus  and  of  the  Epistolce  Poeticce  to  be 
complete  ;  but  he  who  expects  finality  little  knows 
his  Petrarch.  What  follows  may  serve  as  a  char- 
acteristic instance  of  his  method  of  work ;  he  was 
for  ever  polishing,  correcting,  interpolating.  Two 
years  after  writing  the  preface  he  nominally  closed 
the  Familiar  series  with  a  second  dedicatory  letter 
to  Socrates.  "  With  you  I  began,"  he  writes,  "with 
you  I  finish  ;  here,  my  Socrates,  you  have  what  you 
asked  for.  ...  I  began  this  work  in  youth,  I  finish 
it  in  old  age,  or  rather  I  am  still  continuing  what 
I  then  began.  For  this  is  the  one  pursuit  of  mine 
to  which  death  alone  will  put  the  finishing  touch. 
How  can  I  expect  to  cease  from  chatting  with  my 
friends  till  my  life  ceases  ?  .  .  .  Whatever  I  may 
write  in  this  kind  henceforward  will  be  classed  in 
another  volume  under  a  title  derived  from  my  time 


THE   FOUNDER  OF  HUMANISM    217 

of  life,  since  my  friends  are  so  fond  as  to  forbid  my 
withholding  any  of  my  writings  from  them."  Even 
this  was  not  the  final  arrangement.  Socrates  died, 
probably  before  receiving  the  letter  just  quoted, 
and  the  collection,  made  as  a  token  of  devoted 
friendship,  became  its  pathetic  record.  As  such 
Petrarch  once  more  revised  it,  and  while  doing  so 
actually  inserted  a  few  letters  belonging  to  the  four 
intervening  years.  At  last,  in  1365,  with  the  help 
of  one  of  his  pupils,  he  arranged  the  series  practi- 
cally as  we  have  it  to-day.  He  meant  it  to  contain 
350  letters  ;  in  Fracassetti's  edition,  which  is  the 
most  complete,  it  contains  347  ;  but  possibly  some 
of  those  which  Fracassetti  published  as  an  appendix 
were  intended  by  Petrarch  to  have  a  place  in  the 
body  of  the  volume.  The  collection  is  divided  into 
twenty-four  books,  of  which  the  last  contains  the 
Letters  to  Illustrious  Men  of  Antiquity ;  the  rest, 
Petrarch  tells  us,  are  **  for  the  most  part  "  in  chrono- 
logical order,  but  the  qualifying  words  require  a 
pretty  liberal  interpretation.  Besides  these,  he  pre- 
served some  other  letters  which,  to  avoid  repetition 
and  tediousness,  he  kept  by  themselves ;  these 
formed  the  nucleus  of  the  single  book  of  Various 
Lette7^s,  intended  to  contain  seventy  and  actually 
containing  sixty-five  epistles.  The  earliest  letter  of 
all  was  written  in  1326,  the  latest  in  1365  ;  but  sub- 
stantially the  series  extends  from  1331  to  1361, 
with  which  year  the  series  of  Letters  written  in 
Old  Age  begins.  Of  the  authorised  prose  letters, 
we  have  thus  three  classes — the  Familiar,  the 
Various,  and   the  Senile.     In  addition  to  these,  a 


2i8     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

book  is  extant  of  Letters  without  Title  (Sine 
Tittilo),  diatribes  against  the  corruptions  of  Church 
and  clergy,  which  Petrarch  kept  carefully  secret 
during  his  life.  But  as  he  preserved  the  manuscript 
of  them,  we  may  suppose  that  he  intended  them  to 
be  published  after  his  death. 

Of  all  Petrarch's  writings  the  prose  letters  are 
the  most  important ;  of  all  his  Latin  writings  they 
are,  by  a  happy  coincidence,  the  most  delightful 
reading.  As  evidence  of  the  events  of  their  author's 
life,  they  outweigh  all  the  other  biographical  materials 
put  together,  and  this  is  perhaps  the  least  of  their 
many  merits.  The  extracts  given  in  these  pages 
must  have  been  ill-chosen  and  ill-translated  if  the 
reader  has  not  realised  from  them  that  the  letters 
reveal  a  personality  of  singularly  human  interest 
and  poignant  charm.  So  far  as  regards  mere  facts, 
Petrarch's  habit  of  revision  and  interpolation  occa- 
sionally— though  very  seldom  and  only  in  matters 
of  secondary  importance — tends  to  weaken  or  con- 
fuse the  testimony.  But  there  is  not  a  page,  not  a 
line,  not  a  word,  which  does  not  bear  the  true  stamp 
of  its  author's  individuality.  '*  If  we  must  needs 
keep  ourselves  before  the  eye  of  the  public,"  he 
once  wrote,  "  by  all  means  let  us  show  ourselves 
off  in  books  and  chat  in  letters."  Exacdy ;  the 
man  stands  revealed  in  the  "chat"  of  the  letters 
written  to  his  intimate  friends. 

Not  that  he  was  ever  indifferent  to  style.  He 
might  say  with  truth  that  he  wrote  to  his  friends 
whatever  came  uppermost  in  his  own  mind  ;  and  he 
might    believe    himself    to    be    equally    truthful    in 


THE   FOUNDER  OF   HUMANISM     219 

saying  that  he  was  not  careful  about  the  adorn- 
ment of  these  familiar  talks.  But  he  simply  could 
not  be  careless  about  workmanship ;  nature  had 
given  him  the  instinct  for  style,  and  whatever  he 
wrote  must  be  written  with  the  inborn  grace  of  the 
artist. 

He  knew  too  that  a  letter  from  him  was  regarded 
as  a  literary  star  of  the  first  magnitude ;  eager 
friends  copied  the  precious  manuscript  and  circulated 
it  through  Europe.  Boccaccio  speaks  of  these 
letters  with  a  kind  of  rapture  as  equal  to  Cicero's ; 
and  though  the  pronouncement  shows  that  criticism, 
which  Petrarch  had  brought  anew  to  the  birth,  was 
still  in  its  infancy,  it  shows  also  the  extreme  import- 
ance of  the  letters  in  furthering  the  main  work  of 
their  author's  life — the  revival  of  learning. 

In  attributing  to  Petrarch  the  Initiation  of  this 
mighty  movement,  a  word  of  caution  may  be  found 
in  season.  People  sometimes  talk  as  if  history 
could  be  likened  to  a  row  of  pigeon-holes,  and  as  if 
events  once  classified  and  docketed  as  belonging  to 
pigeon-hole  B  could  thenceforward  be  regarded  as 
quite  dissociated  from  the  contents  of  pigeon-hole 
A.  Of  course  nobody  maintains  such  an  absurdity 
in  theory,  but  classification  is  so  useful  an  aid  to 
memory,  that  in  practice  we  are  continually  tempted 
to  draw  hard-and-fast  lines  of  division.  No  error 
is  more  fatal  to  the  right  understanding  of  history  ; 
it  robs  even  definite  events  of  half  their  meaning ; 
much  more  does  It  distort  and  obscure  the  signifi- 
cance of  intellectual  developments.  The  life  of  the 
world's    mind    is   like   the   life   of   a  forest ;    birth, 


220     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

growth,  death,  go  on  side  by  side  ;  while  the  forest 
is  older  than  its  oldest  tree,  its  youngest  sapling 
may  claim  an  immemorial  lineage.  When  there- 
fore we  say  that  Petrarch  founded  Humanism  and 
inaugurated  the  New  Learning,  we  do  not  mean 
that  he  created  something  out  of  nothing  ;  we  mean 
that  he  inspired  ideas  and  modes  of  thought,  which 
preceding  scholars  had  possessed  in  their  own  brains, 
but  could  not  communicate  to  society  at  large.  It 
is  true  that  few  successive  periods  are  as  sharply 
contrasted  as  the  Middle  Ages  and  the  Renais- 
sance ;  but  even  so  it  is  false  history  to  represent 
the  Middle  Ages  as  a  night  of  pitchy  blackness,  the 
Renaissance  as  a  blaze  of  unheralded  light.  Scholar- 
ship had  never  died ;  our  own  England  furnishes 
proof  of  that.  John  of  Salisbury  in  the  twelfth 
century  was  as  good  a  Latinist  as  Petrarch,  and 
Robert  Grosseteste  in  the  thirteenth  had  a  com- 
petent knowledge  of  Greek.  None  the  less  it  is  to 
Petrarch,  not  to  his  predecessors,  that  we  rightly 
attribute  the  inauguration  of  the  Renaissance  ;  they 
were  its  forerunners,  not  its  founders  ;  they  handed 
down  the  torch  of  learning  unextinguished  ;  some 
quality  in  him  enabled  him  to  fire  the  world  with  it. 
His  method  was  not  merely  to  study  the  classics 
as  ancient  literature,  but  to  bring  the  world  back  to 
the  mental  standpoint  of  the  classical  writers.  To 
do  this  it  was  essential  to  spread  the  knowledge  of 
those  writers  as  widely  as  possible,  and  we  have 
seen  how  diligent  he  and  his  friends  were  in  the 
discovery  and  reproduction  of  texts.  Then  men 
had  to  be  convinced  that  the  affairs  of  old  Rome 


THE   FOUNDER  OF  HUMANISM    221 

were  of  vital  interest  to  fourteenth-century  Italy, 
and  so  Petrarch  gave  to  the  world  the  stimulating 
conception  of  the  continuity  of  history.  Lastly,  it 
was  necessary  to  set  up  again  the  fallen  standard  of 
criticism.  Criticism  does  not  mean  fault-finding ; 
the  correction  of  error  is  only  one  of  its  functions. 
Its  main  business  is  to  look  below  the  surface  of 
things,  to  apprehend  their  true  significance,  to 
appraise  their  just  value.  This  intellectual  faculty 
was  conspicuously  lacking  in  the  men  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  but  the  classical  men  possess  it  in  rich  abun- 
dance. Now  of  all  the  classical  writers  known  to 
Petrarch  he  esteemed  Cicero  "  far  and  away  the 
chief  captain,"  the  wisest  thinker,  the  most  discern- 
ing critic,  the  supreme  master  of  style.  Saturated 
himself  with  the  Ciceronian  spirit,  he  set  himself  to 
diffuse  it  through  Europe.  He  was  no  slavish 
worshipper  even  of  Cicero ;  he  paid  his  great 
master  the  higher  compliment  of  discriminating 
enthusiasm.  Like  all  true  apostles,  he  was  less 
concerned  to  imitate  the  manner  of  his  models  than 
to  preach  their  gospel.  This  was  probably  the 
secret  of  his  success  ;  the  revival  of  classical  learn- 
ing became  in  his  hands  a  resurrection  of  the  classi- 
cal spirit. 

Judged  as  mere  compositions,  his  own  Latin 
writings  fell  far  short  of  the  masterpieces  which 
inspired  them,  and  he  himself  was  fully  conscious 
of  their  inferiority.  Once,  he  tells  Boccaccio,  he 
had  thought  of  writing  solely  in  Italian,  moved 
thereto  by  the  consideration  that  the  ancients  had 
written  so  perfectly  in   Latin  as  to  be  inimitable. 


222      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

This  must  have  been  a  mere  passing  thought ;  from 
earHest  youth  onward  he  felt  instinctively  that  to 
write  the  best  Latin  he  could  was  the  way  to  pro- 
pagate the  Roman  culture. 

This  sound  instinct  explains  the  depreciatory 
tone  in  which  he  sometimes  spoke  of  his  Italian 
poems.  It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  man  who 
could  write  the  Canzoniere  was  blind  to  its  beauty  ; 
and  the  pains  which  he  undoubtedly  took  to  polish 
and  perfect  it  show  that  he  appreciated  the  exquisite 
art  of  its  workmanship.  He  knew,  too,  how  greatly 
it  was  instrumental  in  winning  him  the  fame  that  he 
loved.  But,  almost  as  if  he  had  foreseen  the  degrada- 
tion of  the  Petrarchist  school,  he  seems  to  have  felt 
that  not  here  would  lie  his  real  claim  to  the  world's 
gratitude.  It  is  easy  to  go  too  far,  as  Petrarch 
himself  went,  in  minimising  the  importance  of  the 
Canzoniere.  The  poems  are  quick  with  the  genius 
of  Humanism,  and  their  revelation  of  the  subtlest 
workings  of  a  human  soul  must  have  done  much  to 
imbue  mankind  with  a  thirst  for  the  study  of  man. 
Still  it  remains  a  curious  fact  that  Petrarch's  most 
beautiful  poetry  was  precisely  the  least  influential  of 
his  writings  in  furthering  his  life's  work. 

It  has  already  been  said  that  the  most  influential 
were  the  prose  letters,  which  contain  samples  of 
everything  that  can  possibly  be  put  into  epistolary 
form.  Far  inferior  to  them  in  charm,  but  almost 
equally  important  in  the  history  of  literature,  are 
the  three  books  of  poetical  letters.  These  too 
contain  an  infinite  variety  of  subjects,  from  im- 
passioned appeals  to  successive  Popes  for  the  re- 


THE   FOUNDER  OF   HUMANISM     223 

storation  of  the  Papacy  to  a  graceful  description  of 
his  "  battle  with  the  Nymphs  of  the  Sorgue "  for 
the  reclamation  of  a  orarden  for  the  Muses.  It  is 
hardly  possible  for  us  to  appreciate  these  poems  at 
their  full  value.  Petrarch  indeed  handles  Latin  as 
a  living  language,  his  idiom  is  seldom  seriously  at 
fault,  his  diction  is  choice  and  his  versification 
fluent ;  his  hexameters  might  quite  well  be  mis- 
taken, as  actually  happened  in  the  case  of  a  passage 
from  the  Africa,  for  those  of  some  poet  of  the 
Silver  Age.  But  our  ears  have  been  attuned  to 
finer  harmonies,  and  Petrarch's  verses  cannot  stand 
comparison  with  those  of  Virgil  and  Horace,  or  even 
with  the  graceful  compositions  of  Politian,  the  most 
accomplished  Humanist  of  the  following  century. 
Moreover,  defects  of  form  are  much  more  notice- 
able, not  to  say  more  irritating,  in  verse  than  in 
prose ;  and  rich  as  are  these  poetical  letters  in 
biographical  and  literary  interest,  we  cannot  read 
them  with  quite  the  enjoyment  that  the  prose  col- 
lection affords. 

Yet  more  tedious  to  our  modern  taste,  but  of 
superlative  historical  value,  is  the  Book  of  Eclogues, 
containing  twelve  so-called  "pastoral"  poems.  Here 
we  have  the  completes!  fusion  ever  achieved  be- 
tween the  mediaeval  and  the  classical  methods. 
The  mediaeval  doctrine  that  poetry  is  allegory  is 
taken  up  by  Petrarch,  approved,  and  acted  on.  But 
the  allegory  takes  a  classical  shape.  Arcady,  that 
migratory  realm  of  poetic  fancy,  is  transported  to 
Provence ;  in  the  guise  of  the  shepherds  and 
nymphs  who  inhabit  it  we  are  introduced  to  Petrarch 


224     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

himself — usually  designated  Silvius  or  Silvanus, 
the  lover  of  forest  and  hill  —  to  his  brother,  to 
Socrates  and  Laura,  to  Popes  and  Cardinals,  to 
personifications  of  the  city  of  Avignon  and  of  the 
Spirit  of  Religious  Consolation,  and  to  no  less  a 
personage  than  St.  Peter  himself.  These  all  take 
part  in  "pastoral"  dialogues,  which  thinly  veil  the 
expression  of  the  poet's  feelings  or  the  discussion  of 
contemporary  events.  It  is  all  tiresomely  artificial 
and  unreal ;  but  Petrarch  was  persuaded  that  Virgil 
had  done  just  the  same  in  the  eclogues  on  which 
his  own  were  modelled.  Whatever  we  may  think 
of  them  now,  these  "  pastoral "  poems  hit  the  taste 
of  the  day  and  enjoyed  an  extraordinary  vogue. 

Petrarch's  most  considerable  work  in  Latin  verse, 
the  Africa,  remains  to  be  noticed.  The  story  of 
its  composition  has  been  told  already,  how  it  was 
conceived  and  partly  written  during  the  first 
residence  at  Vaucluse  ;  then  put  aside  for  a  year  or 
two  ;  then,  under  the  stimulus  of  the  recent  corona- 
tion, resumed  during  the  walks  in  the  Selva  Plana, 
and  finished  with  a  rush  at  Parma.  So  far  as  any 
work  of  Petrarch's  could  be  called  complete  during 
his  lifetime,  we  have  it  on  his  own  authority  that 
the  Africa  was  completed  in  1341.  But  he  did  not 
hurry  its  publication  ;  he  kept  it  by  him  for  the 
usual  revision,  and  some  years  passed  before  even 
his  closest  friends  were  allowed  a  glimpse  of  it. 
Presently  he  so  far  yielded  to  Barbato's  importunity 
as  to  send  him  the  passage  which  narrates  the 
death  of  Sophonisba.  This  is  the  passage  which  a 
French  critic  in   the   eighteenth    century  declared 


THE   FOUNDER  OF   HUMANISM     225 

had  been  stolen  from  the  Pnnica  of  Silius  ItaHcus  ; 
and  it  is  noticeable,  as  evidence  of  the  quality  of 
Petrarch's  Latin,  that  the  refutation  of  the  calumny, 
complete  as  it  is,  rests  on  external  evidence  and  on 
the  obvious  appropriateness  of  the  lines  to  their 
position  in  the  Africa,  not  on  any  marked  inferi- 
ority of  Petrarch's  hexameters  to  those  of  Silius. 
With  the  exception  of  this  detached  extract,  the 
poem  was  still  kept  for  many  years  secluded  in  its 
author's  library ;  and  as  time  went  on  he  came  to 
regard  it  with  mingled  feelings  of  hope  and  dis- 
appointment. It  was  to  have  been  the  supreme 
effort  of  his  imagination,  the  choice  fruit  of  poetic 
genius  which  should  justify  in  the  sight  of  all 
posterity  his  reception  of  the  laurel  crown,  the  proof 
that  an  Italian  of  the  fourteenth  century  could  write 
a  Roman  epic,  not  perhaps  quite  a  rival  to  the 
y^7ieid,  but  not  altogether  unworthy  of  a  place 
beside  it.  He  never  quite  resigned  the  hope  that 
in  the  Africa  this  high  ambition  was  achieved  ;  but 
he  suffered  grievous  pangs  of  doubt,  and  more  than 
once  declared  his  intention  of  throwing  the  poem 
into  the  fire,  "  being  far  too  severe  a  critic  of  his 
own  performances,"  says  Boccaccio. 

How  far  the  Africa  can  be  called  a  success  must 
depend  on  our  estimate  of  the  effect  produced  by 
it.  Judged  by  a  purely  literary  standard,  it  must 
be  pronounced  a  meritorious  failure,  though  in 
justice  to  its  author  stress  should  be  laid  on  the 
merit.  The  conception  is  a  fine  one,  and  the  whole 
poem  is  inspired  by  enthusiasm  for  Rome.  In 
Scipio  Petrarch  was  celebrating  his  ideal  hero,  and 

Q 


226      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

it  would  be  hard  to  find  an  historical  subject  more 
congenial  to  epic  treatment  than  the  end  of  the 
Second  Punic  War.  Petrarch  was  fully  alive  to 
these  advantages  and  spared  no  pains  to  give  effect 
to  them.  Unfortunately  the  art  is  a  little  too 
obvious  ;  the  epic  stage -properties  are  unmistak- 
ably second-hand,  the  machinery  creaks,  the  magic 
spell  of  illusion  is  wanting.  The  whole  poem  is 
reminiscent  of  the  y^neid  and  of  what  Petrarch 
knew  about  the  Iliad ;  we  have  a  palace  decorated 
with  numberless  pictures  from  the  mythology,  a 
banquet  followed  by  a  sketch  of  Roman  history,  the 
death  of  an  unhappy  queen,  a  prophetic  apparition 
of  Homer.  Only  a  journey  to  Hades  and  a  con- 
clave of  the  gods  are  wanting ;  instead  of  them  we 
have  an  astonishing  scene  in  heaven,  in  which  the 
Almighty  expounds  Christian  dogma  to  allegorical 
impersonations  of  Rome  and  Carthage.  Here  we 
touch  the  root  of  the  whole  failure.  Petrarch  is  too 
earnest  in  his  plea  for  Rome  to  lose  himself  in  his 
subject;  for  once  he  is  too  much  a  missionary  to  be 
quite  successfully  a  poet. 

Artistically,  then,  the  Africa  is  a  failure,  but 
historically  it  holds  a  notable  place  in  the  revival  of 
learning.  Though  it  was  never  definitely  "pub- 
lished," we  must  infer  from  Boccaccio's  allusions 
that  some  scholars  at  least  had  access  to  it ;  and 
the  mere  fact  of  its  existence  inclined  men's  minds 
to  consider  the  possibilities  of  poetry.  They  heard 
with  admiration  that  a  contemporary  of  their  own 
had  dared  to  follow  in  Virgil's  footsteps,  and  to 
compose  a  great  epic  in  the  tongue  which  made  it 


THE   FOUNDER  OF   HUMANISM    227 

the  common  property  of  scholars  in  all  lands. 
Boccaccio,  in  the  passage  already  quoted,  mentions 
the  Africa  among  Petrarch's  most  important  works, 
"which,"  he  says,  "we  will  read,  and  on  which  we  will 
comment  even  during  the  lifetime  of  their  author." 

In  the  same  category  Boccaccio  places  several  of 
those  treatises  and  disquisitions  which  also  played 
an  important  part  in  fostering  the  humanistic  spirit. 
The  books  On  the  Solitary  Life  and  On  the 
Remedies  of  Good  and  Bad  Fortune  in  particular 
had  in  their  day  an  extraordinary  reputation  and  a 
potent  influence.  Nobody  reads  them  now ;  and 
that  is  a  pity,  for  they  are  much  better  reading 
than  a  good  deal  of  the  literature  that  has  super- 
seded them.  Petrarch  would  have  based  on  them 
his  claim  to  be  ranked  as  a  "philosopher,"  and  the 
men  of  his  day  would  have  allowed  the  claim. 
Nothing  could  more  clearly  mark  the  difference 
between  the  new  learning  and  the  old.  Mediaeval 
philosophy  was  the  science  of  exact  thought,  and 
had  as  little  as  possible  to  do  with  literature ;  its 
burning  question,  the  Nominalist  and  Realist  con- 
troversy, was  concerned  with  metaphysical  defini- 
tions in  just  that  region  of  metaphysics  that  lies 
nearest  to  theology.  Similarly  we  find  that  even 
Dante,  incomparably  the  greatest  man  of  letters  of 
his  day,  in  composing  his  treatise  De  Monarchid, 
handled  theoretical  politics  by  the  deductive  method. 
Petrarch  breaks  loose  from  the  austere  discipline  of 
logical  process  and  formula.  In  his  treatises,  as 
in  his  letters,  he  takes  his  readers  back  to  the 
Ciceronian  standpoint  and  invites  them  to  investigate 


228      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

truth  by  literary  methods.  Not  for  a  moment  does 
he  exalt  style  above  matter;  what  we  call  "style 
for  style's  sake  "  is  an  abomination  to  him.  But  he 
requires  that  a  man  of  letters  shall  employ  a  good 
style  for  the  adornment  of  good  matter ;  and  if  a 
man  will  only  take  example  by  Cicero,  he  shall 
know  how  to  achieve  the  combination. 

Exactly  the  same  is  true  of  his  work  as  an  his- 
torian ;  he  discards  the  methods  of  the  chroniclers 
and  reverts  to  those  of  Plutarch.  His  greatest 
work,  the  Lives  of  Illustrious  Men,  is  a  history  of 
classical  Rome  set  forth  in  thirty-one  biographies 
of  great  men  from  Romulus  to  Caesar.  Consider- 
ing the  materials  at  Petrarch's  disposal,  this  is  a 
stupendous  achievement ;  and  the  scale  on  which  it 
is  planned  no  less  than  the  method  of  its  execution 
marks  it  as  the  first  of  modern  histories.  In  the 
1874  edition  it  occupies  over  750  octavo  pages,  of 
which  over  350  are  given  to  the  life  of  Caesar. 
The  knowledge  that  Petrarch  was  engaged  on  it 
created  no  small  stir  in  the  world  ;  we  have  seen 
that  Charles  IV  eagerly  questioned  him  about  its 
progress.  Its  very  excellence,  indeed,  probably 
hastened  the  day  of  its  supersession  ;  it  must  have 
kindled  an  interest  in  historical  research  fatal  to  its 
continued  use  as  a  textbook.  Before  the  invention 
of  printing  it  had  been  forgotten,  and  only  the 
jejune  Epitome,  on  which  Petrarch  was  engaged  at 
the  time  of  his  death,  appears  in  the  earlier  editions 
of  his  works.  Domenico  Rossetti,  the  editor  of 
Petrarch's  lesser  Latin  poems,  unearthed  the  original 
and  corrected  the  erroneous  attribution  of  part  of  it 


THE   FOUNDER   OF   HUMANISM     229 

to  Giulio  Celso ;  Luigi  Razzolini  published  the 
complete  text  with  an  Italian  translation  in  1874; 
thanks  to  these  two  scholars,  we  now  have  easy- 
access  to  the  work  which  most  completely  illustrates 
Petrarch's  sense  of  the  continuity  of  history,  his 
zeal  for  Rome,  and  the  methods  by  which  he 
enabled  the  world  to  possess  once  again  the  splendid 
heritage  of  her  literature. 

Yet  when  all  is  said  and  done,  it  is  not  by  the 
letter  but  by  the  spirit  of  his  Latin  writings  that 
Petrarch  holds  his  rank  among  the  great  masters 
whose  work  endures  through  the  ages.  He  was 
not  the  only  man  of  his  day  who  had  the  right 
instinct  for  culture  or  the  power  to  discern  the 
beauties  of  classical  literature.  But  he  was  the  one 
whom  nature  had  gifted  with  the  magnetic  power 
to  kindle  men's  zeal  and  make  their  enthusiasm 
fruitful.  His  personality  impressed  itself  on  the 
whole  movement;  his  very  foibles  are  the  character- 
istic foibles  of  his  successors.  Like  him,  they  were 
self-conscious  men  whose  eagerness  about  their 
personal  reputation  was  not  free  from  the  taint  of 
vanity.  Many  of  them  carried  to  excess  the  faults 
which  in  their  master  had  been  the  trivial  blemishes 
of  a  most  lovable  character.  But  if  the  world 
inherited  from  Petrarch  a  little  restlessness,  a  little 
vanity,  a  little  self-consciousness,  he  bequeathed  to 
it  also  a  faculty  of  right  judgment,  a  tradition  of 
unwearied  diligence,  a  noble  ardour  of  research. 
Therefore,  and  not  because  he  wrote  the  Africa, 
the  Lives  of  Illustrious  Me?t,  or  even  the  Letters, 
we  hail  him  in  Boccaccio's  phrase  as  "our  illustrious 
teacher,  father,  and  lord." 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE   SORROWFUL  YEARS   OF  THE 
SECOND   PLAGUE— DEATHS   OF   FRIENDS 

1360-1363 

IN  1360  the  French  had  at  last  succeeded  in 
raisino"  their  Kind's  ransom,  and  the  Peace  of 
Bretigny  was  signed  on  May  8th.  A  considerable 
contribution  to  the  ransom  had  come  out  of  the 
coffers  of  Galeazzo  Visconti,  who  furnished  six 
hundred  thousand  florins  on  condition  that  his  son 
Gian-Galeazzo  should  marry  the  Princess  Isabelle 
of  France.  The  bargain  was  duly  carried  out,  and 
in  October  the  two  children,  whose  united  ages 
amounted  to  twenty-three  years,  the  bride  being  a 
year  the  elder,  were  solemnly  joined  together  in 
holy  matrimony  at  Milan. 

The  connection  with  the  House  of  Valois  was  a 
good  stroke  of  business  for  Galeazzo,  but  his  first 
embassy  to  Paris  was  sent  on  an  errand  of  courtesy 
rather  than  of  negotiation.  It  went  in  December, 
to  offer  Galeazzo's  congratulations  to  King  John  on 
his  return  to  his  capital,  and  who  so  fit  as  Petrarch 
to  be  its  spokesman  ?  At  the  state  reception  Pet- 
rarch delivered  a  harangue,  in  which  the  leading 
theme  was  the  vicissitudes  of  fortune.  To  our 
modern  sensitive  ears  the  subject  seems  rather  a 

230 


THE   SECOND    PLAGUE  231 

ticklish  one  under  the  circumstances,  but  people  in 
the  fourteenth  century  underwent  too  many  of  these 
vicissitudes  to  be  squeamish  in  talking  about  them. 
And  the  orator  had  evidently  gauged  the  taste  of 
his  principal  auditors,   for  the   King  and  his  heir 
apparent  not  only  pricked  up  their  ears  at  the  men- 
tion of  fortune,  but  proposed  to  recur  to  the  subject 
on  a  less  formal  occasion,  when  they  even  promised 
themselves    the    sport   of    confuting   their    learned 
guest.      So  after  dinner  up  came  the  Prince  with 
Peter   of   Poitiers,   the  translator  of   Livy,   and   a 
bevy  of  other  scholars  at  his  heels,  and  demanded 
a    discourse    upon    the    nature    and    attributes    of 
Fortune.     A    friendly    colleague,    zealous    for    the 
honour  of  his    fellow- Italian,   had    given   Petrarch 
a  hint  of  what  was  coming,    so  that  he   was    not 
quite   unprepared,   though    he   would   dearly    have 
liked  time  for  a  peep  at  some  books  of  reference. 
Still  he  came  off  with  credit,  and  the  company  was 
not  inclined  to  contest  his  dictum  that  Fortune  was 
a  mere  name,  a  popular  superstition,  but  of  service 
now  and  then  to  the  learned  in  the  embellishment 
of  their  phrases.     The  credit  of  Italy  was  saved, 
and   her   champion  went  victorious  to  bed.     The 
Prince,  who  must  have  been  a  very  glutton  of  talk, 
was  for  renewing  the  discussion   in   the  morning, 
when  the  ambassadors  had  audience  of  the  King. 
But  the  talk  went  off  on  other  matters,  and  in  spite 
of  prompting  nods  and  becks  from  the  disappointed 
Prince,  the  topic  had  not  been  reached  when  the 
time  came  to  terminate  the  audience. 

Petrarch  spent   altogether   about   three    months 


232      PETRARCH   AND    HIS   TIMES 

over  this  embassy.  After  making  full  allowance 
for  the  probable  delays  of  Alpine  travel  in  mid- 
winter, we  may  suppose  that  two-thirds  of  the  time 
would  be  spent  in  Paris,  for  we  do  not  hear  of  the 
ambassador's  staying  at  intermediate  places,  but 
only  of  his  passing  through  a  country  which  thirty 
years  ago  had  seemed  to  him  a  picture  of  wealth  and 
prosperity,  but  which  he  now  found  desolate  and 
barren,  with  farms  deserted  and  houses  tumbling  to 
decay.  A  feature  of  his  visit  which  gave  him 
especial  pleasure  was  the  renewal  of  his  acquaint- 
ance with  Peter  of  Poitiers,  who  had  testified  his 
admiration  for  him  years  before  by  going  to  seek 
him  out  at  Vaucluse. 

In  March  he  was  back  at  Milan,  and  a  few 
months  later  received  there  a  fresh  token  of  the 
Emperor's  esteem  and  regard.  Charles  sent  him 
his  own  golden  drinking-cup,  and  accompanied  the 
gift  with  a  letter  of  profuse  compliment  in  which  he 
invited  him  to  return  to  Prague.  Petrarch  thanked 
him  for  both  bowl  and  letter  in  the  warmest  terms, 
and  very  gracefully  accepted  the  invitation  of  which 
he  hoped  he  might  avail  himself  when  the  unhealthy 
season  of  late  summer  and  early  autumn  was  past. 
But  he  did  not  forget  to  say  roundly,  though  with 
perfect  courtesy,  that  the  better  course  would  have 
been  for  the  Emperor  to  accept  his  invitation  to 
come  to  Italy.  "Yours  is  the  upper  hand  in  virtue 
of  your  position,  Csesar,"  he  writes,  "but  mine  by 
the  goodness  of  my  cause.  You  summon  me  to 
honourable — I  grant  you  that — and  delightful  en- 
joyment ;    I    call    you    to    high    emprise,    to    your 


THE   SECOND    PLAGUE  233 

enforced  and  bounden  duty,  which  is  indeed  so 
plainly  your  duty  that  you  may  be  thought  to  have 
been  brought  to  birth  for  no  other  purpose."  And 
this  is  only  one  of  many  similar  appeals  addressed 
to  Charles  in  the  years  now  under  review. 

From  the  middle  of  1361  to  the  end  of  1363,  the 
story  is  little  else  than  a  record  of  deaths.  The 
plague,  never  entirely  subdued,  broke  out  again 
with  a  virulence  that  in  some  places  even  exceeded 
that  of  the  first  terrible  visitation.  One  after 
another  Petrarch's  dearest  friends  died,  till  of  those 
who  had  made  the  season  of  his  manhood  so 
fruitful  in  affection  only  three  or  four  remained  to 
share  with  him  the  joys  and  sorrows  of  age. 
Younger  men,  indeed,  were  gathering  round  him, 
who  would  cherish  his  later  years  with  filial  piety, 
but  only  Guido  Settimo,  Philip  de  Cabassoles,  and 
Boccaccio  were  left  of  those  who  had  cheered  him 
in  youth's  struggles,  or  rejoiced,  with  a  joy  that  no 
achievement  of  their  own  could  have  inspired,  in 
the  triumphs  of  his  maturer  manhood. 

The  first  bereavement  of  which  he  had  know- 
ledge, though  not  the  first  in  order  of  occurrence, 
was  the  death  of  his  son.  All  Giovanni's  misdeeds 
had  not  quenched  the  fiame  of  natural  affection  in 
Petrarch's  heart.  "  I  talked  of  hating  him  while 
he  lived,"  he  wrote  to  Nelli ;  "  now  that  he  is  dead, 
I  love  him  with  my  mind,  hold  him  in  my  heart, 
and  embrace  him  in  memory.  My  eyes  look  for 
him,  alas!  in  vain."  The  Virgil  fly-leaf  has  this 
entry:  "Our  Giovanni,  a  man  born  to  bring  toil 
and  grief  to  me,  afflicted  me  with  heavy  and  con- 


234     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

stant  anxieties  during  his  life,  and  wounded  me 
with  pangs  of  sorrow  by  his  death.  For  having 
known  but  few  happy  days  in  his  Hfe,  he  died  in  the 
year  of  our  Lord  1361,  the  twenty-fourth  of  his 
age,  at  midnight  between  Friday  the  ninth  and 
Saturday  the  tenth  day  of  July.  The  news  reached 
me  on  the  fourteenth  of  the  month,  at  evening. 
And  he  died  at  Milan,  in  that  unexampled  general 
slaughter  by  the  plague  from  which  that  city  had 
previously  been  exempt,  but  which  then  found  its 
way  thither  and  invaded  it." 

Three  weeks  later  he  heard  first  a  vague  report 
and  then  only  too  certain  news  of  a  still  greater 
sorrow,  the  greatest,  indeed,  that  could  possibly 
befall  him  :  Socrates  had  died  exactly  three  months 
aofo  in  Avienon,  and  all  this  time  Petrarch  had 
been  ignorant  of  his  loss.  It  sounds  incredible,  but 
the  note  in  the  Virgil  is  positive  and  precise  ; 
Petrarch,  often  so  careless  of  chronology,  noted 
these  days  of  bereavement  with  the  closest  exacti- 
tude. "  In  the  same  year,"  the  note  proceeds,  "on 
the  8th  of  August,  first  a  doubtful  report  from  one 
of  my  servants  on  his  return  from  Milan,  and 
presently  on  Wednesday  the  i8th  of  the  same 
month  sure  intelligence  brought  by  a  retainer  of 
the  Cardinal  Theatine  coming  from  Rome,  reached 
me  of  the  death  of  Socrates,  my  friend  and  best 
brother,  who  is  said  to  have  been  dead  since  last 
May  in  Babylon,  otherwise  called  Avignon.  I  have 
lost  my  life's  companion  and  comfort ;  Christ  Jesus, 
receive  these  two  and  the  other  five  into  Thine 
everlasting    habitations,    that    as    they    cannot    be 


THE   SECOND    PLAGUE  235 

longer  with  me  here  below,  they  may  enjoy  the 
blessed  exchange  of  life  with  Thee."  And  to  Nelli 
he  writes  :  "  Socrates  was  born  in  a  different  part 
of  the  world  from  ours,  but  from  the  very  moment 
of  our  meeting,  his  look,  his  disposition,  and  his 
worth  made  us  of  one  mind,  so  that  never  from 
that  day  have  I  known  his  zeal  for  my  interests 
falter  or  his  devotion  slacken  for  a  single  instant." 

The  latter  part  of  the  year  was  brightened  by  an 
event  of  happy  omen  destined  to  be  happily  ful- 
filled :  Petrarch's  daughter  Francesca,  now  eighteen 
years  old,  was  married  to  Francesco  da  Brossano,  a 
Milanese  of  good  family,  whom  Boccaccio  describes 
as  a  very  tall  young  man  of  placid  countenance, 
sober  speech,  and  refined  manners.  Francesca  and 
her  husband  made  their  home  with  Petrarch  ;  she 
was  a  devoted  daughter,  Francesco  a  model  son-in- 
law  ;  with  them,  and  by  and  bye  with  his  little 
grandchildren,  Petrarch  found  the  chief  happiness 
of  his  later  years.  The  eldest  of  these  was  the 
little  Eletta,  born  in  the  following  year;  a  boy  whom 
they  named  Francesco  was  born  in  1366,  but  died 
only  two  years  later,  in  the  summer  of  1368. 

Azzo  da  Correggio  died  in  1362.  For  him  Pet- 
rarch had  written  his  Remedies  of  Good  and  Bad 
Fortu7te;  the  subject  was  singularly  appropriate  to 
the  vicissitudes  of  that  stormy  career,  but  only  a 
friend's  partiality  could  lay  the  blame  on  Fortune. 
Azzo  had  been  his  own  architect,  and  had  himself 
to  thank  when  his  house  lay  in  ruins.  Fortune, 
indeed,  had  done  all  that  she  could  for  him  ;  he  had 
brilliant  talents,  aptitude  for  statesmanship,   extra- 


236     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

ordinary  charm  of  manner,  and  early  opportunities 
of  employing  his  gifts  with  advantage.  He  threw 
everything  away  from  sheer  over-indulgence  in 
treacheries.  It  was  not  fickleness,  but  a  kind  of 
natural  obliquity  which  set  him  scheming,  as  soon 
as  he  had  concluded  a  bargain,  how  to  get  more 
gain  by  breaking  than  by  keeping  it.  Mere  lack  of 
scruple  would  not  have  hindered  him ;  on  the 
contrary,  morality  was  nothing  accounted  of  among 
the  princes  of  Italy,  and  a  man  might  very  easily 
be  too  nice  in  his  sense  of  honour  to  serve  them ; 
but  there  comes  a  point  at  which  a  reputation  for 
treachery  makes  the  traitor  still  more  unserviceable 
as  a  tool  than  the  honest  man.  Azzo  reached  that 
point,  and  passed  it ;  and  so  he,  who  might  have 
ruled  Parma  and  founded  a  great  library,  died,  a 
discredited  exile,  after  losing  most  of  his  property 
by  confiscation,  and  having  to  spend  nearly  all  that 
remained  in  ransoming  his  wife  and  two  children 
from  the  prison  in  which  the  third  child  had  miser- 
ably perished. 

In  the  early  spring  of  1362  Petrarch  thought  of 
returning  to  Vaucluse,  and  actually  started  on  his 
journey,  but  the  disturbed  state  of  Lombardy  made 
travel  impossible,  and  he  was  forced  to  return. 
Then  came  a  pressing  invitation  from  the  Emperor 
to  fulfil  his  promise  of  visiting  Prague  ;  again  he 
started,  and  again  the  presence  of  hostile  armies 
forced  him  to  go  back  first  to  Padua,  and  thence,  to 
escape  a  virulent  outbreak  of  the  plague,  to  Venice. 
It  was  just  at  this  time,  when  he  might  well  have 
been  excused  if  the  miseries  of  the  past  year  had 


THE   SECOND    PLAGUE  237 

broken  his  nerve,  that  he  gave  a  signal  instance  of 
his  self-possession  and  freedom  from  those  super- 
stitions to  which  his  contemporaries  were  so  prone. 
A  fanatical  Carthusian  monk,  to  whom  all  secular 
learning  seemed  a  snare  of  the  devil,  visited 
Boccaccio  and  told  him  that  a  certain  holy  man, 
named  Peter  of  Siena,  a  worker  of  miracles,  had  had 
on  his  death-bed  a  vision  telling  him  that  Boccaccio, 
Petrarch,  and  some  others  would  very  soon  die, 
and  that  if  they  would  escape  damnation,  they  must 
amend  their  lives  and  give  up  profane  literature. 
For  once,  Boccaccio  was  thrown  off  his  mental 
balance ;  in  times  of  pestilence  very  sane  men  may 
lose  their  heads,  and  in  Boccaccio's  versatile  nature 
there  was  a  strain  of  melancholy,  which  in  a  man 
of  narrower  sympathies  might  have  degenerated 
into  moroseness.  For  the  moment  he  was  thoroughly 
frightened,  and  wrote  to  Petrarch  that  he  must  obey 
the  divinely  sent  command,  get  rid  of  his  books, 
and  devote  himself  to  an  ascetic  life.  Petrarch 
replied  in  a  letter  which  ranks  among  the  noblest  of 
his  prose  writings. 

You  tell  me,  he  writes  in  effect,  that  this  holy 
man  had  a  vision  of  the  Saviour,  and  so  discerned 
all  truth :  a  great  sight  for  mortal  eyes  to  see. 
Great  indeed,  I  agree  with  you,  if  genuine  ;  but 
how  often  have  we  not  known  this  tale  of  a  vision 
made  a  cloak  for  imposture  ?  And  having  visited 
you,  his  messenger  proposed,  I  understand,  to  go  to 
Naples,  thence  to  Gaul  and  Britain,  and  then  lastly 
to  me.  Well,  when  he  comes,  I  will  examine  him 
closely  ;    his  looks,  his  demeanour,   his  behaviour 


238      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

under  questioning,  and  so  forth,  shall  help  me  to 
judge  of  his  truthfulness.  And  the  holy  man  on 
his  death-bed  saw  us  two  and  a  few  others  to  whom 
he  had  a  secret  message,  which  he  charged  this 
visitor  of  yours  to  give  us  ;  so,  if  I  understand  you 
rightly,  runs  the  story.  Well,  the  message  to  you 
is  twofold  :  you  have  not  long  to  live,  and  you  must 
give  up  poetry.  Hence  your  trouble,  which  I  made 
my  own  while  reading  your  letter,  but  which  I  put 
away  from  me  on  thinking  it  over,  as  you  will  do 
also  ;  for  if  you  will  only  give  heed  to  me,  or  rather 
to  your  own  natural  good  sense,  you  will  see  that 
you  have  been  distressing  yourself  about  a  thing 
that  should  have  pleased  you.  Now,  if  this  mes- 
sage is  really  from  the  Lord,  it  must  be  pure  truth. 
But  is  it  from  the  Lord  ?  Or  has  its  real  author 
used  the  Lord's  name  to  oive  weiofht  to  his  own 
saying  ?  I  grant  you  the  frequency  of  death-bed 
prophecies ;  the  histories  of  Greece  and  Rome 
are  full  of  instances ;  but  even  if  we  allow  that  these 
old  stories  and  your  monitor's  present  tale  are  all 
true,  still  what  is  there  to  distress  you  so  terribly  ? 
What  is  there  new  in  all  this  ?  You  knew  without 
his  telling  you  that  you  could  not  have  a  very  long 
span  of  life  before  you.  And  is  not  our  life  here 
labour  and  sorrow,  and  is  it  not  its  chief  merit  that 
it  is  the  road  to  a  better?  Do  not  philosophers, 
writers  of  Holy  Scripture,  and  fathers  of  the 
Church  all  asfree  in  tellino-  us  that  death  is  more 
to  be  desired  than  life  ?  All  this  you  know,  and 
I  am  teaching  you  nothing  new,  but  only  bringing 
back  to  your  mind  the  knowledge   which   it   held 


THE   SECOND    PLAGUE  239 

before  this  shock  paralysed  your  memory.  This  at 
least  all  must  grant,  that  we  ought  not  greatly  to 
love  life,  but  that  we  arc  bound  to  endure  it  to  the 
end,  and  seek  to  make  its  hard  way  the  path  to  our 
desired  home.  Yes,  it  is  not  death  that  is  to  be 
feared,  but  life  that  is  to  be  lived  by  the  Christian 
rule.  Ah !  but  you  have  come  to  old  age,  says 
your  monitor.  Death  cannot  be  far  off.  Look  to 
your  soul.  Well,  I  grant  you  that  scholarship  may 
be  an  unreasonable  and  even  bitter  pursuit  for  the 
old,  if  they  take  it  up  for  the  first  time,  but  if  you 
and  your  scholarship  have  grown  old  together,  'tis 
the  pleasantest  of  comforts.  Forsake  the  Muses, 
says  he  ;  many  things  that  may  grace  a  lad  are 
a  disgrace  to  an  old  man  :  wit  and  the  senses  fail 
you.  Nay,  I  answer,  when  he  bids  you  pluck  sin 
from  your  heart,  he  speaks  well  and  prudently  ;  but 
why  forsake  learning,  in  which  you  are  no  novice, 
but  an  expert  able  to  discern  what  to  choose  and 
what  to  refuse ;  which  has  become  not  a  toil,  but  a 
delight  to  you,  and  which  you  have  skill  to  use  for 
the  furtherance  of  knowledge,  eloquence,  and  re- 
ligion ?  What !  Shall  we  Christians  who  know 
exactly  what  to  think  of  the  gods  of  the  mythology 
renounce  the  classics  and  yet  read  the  really  danger- 
ous books  of  the  heretics  ?  'Tis  the  sure  mark  of 
ignorance  to  despise  what  it  cannot  understand  and 
to  try  to  bar  against  others  the  way  in  which  it  has 
no  skill  to  walk.  Learning  rightly  used  does  not 
hinder,  but  helps  the  conduct  of  life.  It  is  like  a 
meat  which  may  disagree  with  the  sick,  but  gives 
strength  to  the  healthy.     All  history  is  full  of  ex- 


240     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

amples  of  good  men  who  have  loved  learning,  and 
though  many  unlettered  men  have  attained  to  holi- 
ness, no  man  was  ever  debarred  from  holiness  by 
letters.  Good  men  all  have  one  and  the  same  goal, 
but  the  roads  to  it  are  many.  Each  man  travels 
his  own  way,  but  the  lofty  ways  are  better  than  the 
low ;  piety  with  learning  is  better  than  piety  with- 
out it,  and  for  every  unlettered  saint  you  can  name 
me,  I  will  name  you  a  greater  saint  proficient  in 
letters. 

But  if,  in  spite  of  all  this,  you  persist  in  your 
intention,  and  if  you  must  needs  throw  away  not 
only  your  learning,  but  the  poor  instruments  of  it, 
then  I  thank  you  for  giving  me  the  refusal  of  your 
books.  I  will  buy  your  library,  if  it  must  be  sold, 
for  I  would  not  that  the  books  of  so  great  a  man 
should  be  dispersed  abroad  and  hawked  about  by 
unworthy  hands,  I  will  buy  it  and  unite  it  with  my 
own  ;  then  some  day  this  mood  of  yours  will  pass, 
some  day  you  will  come  back  to  your  old  devotion. 
Then  you  will  make  your  home  with  me  :  you  will 
find  your  own  books  side  by  side  with  mine,  which 
are  equally  yours.  Thenceforth  we  shall  share  a 
common  life  and  a  common  library,  and  when  the 
survivor  of  us  is  dead,  the  books  shall  go  to  some 
place  where  they  will  be  kept  together  and  duti- 
fully tended,  in  perpetual  memory  of  us  who  owned 
them. 

There  is  no  need  to  enlarge  upon  the  excellence 
of  this  remarkable  letter.  It  tells  its  own  comfort- 
ing tale  of  sane  piety,  loyalty  to  a  high  calling,  and 
considerate  devotion  to  a  friend.     Only  a  true  lover 


THE   SECOND    PLAGUE  241 

of  books  and  men  could  have  written  the  concluding 
sentences. 

The  libraries,  however,  were  never  united  ;  Boc- 
caccio was  soon  healed  of  his  mental  sickness,  and 
went  back  to  his  books  with  a  convalescent's 
appetite.  But  Petrarch  made  the  intended  pro- 
vision for  his  own  books.  He  reserved  the  whole 
property  in  them  to  himself  for  his  lifetime,  but 
assigned  them  not  by  a  mere  will,  but  by  a  memor- 
andum intended  to  be  embodied  in  an  irrevocable 
deed,  to  the  Republic  of  Venice  after  his  death. 
There  is  no  evidence  that  this  deed  was  ever  duly 
signed,  sealed,  and  delivered  ;  but  the  validity  of 
the  bargain  is  indisputable,  for  Petrarch  accepted 
and  enjoyed  the  consideration.  The  Palazzo 
Molina,  or  Palace  of  the  Two  Towers,  was  assigned 
to  him,  and  became  his  chief  residence  till  war  be- 
tween Venice  and  Padua  made  sojourn  in  the  former 
city  unpleasant  to  him.  His  books  therefore  should 
have  gone  to  Venice,  and  to  this  day  visitors  are 
told  that  they  formed  the  nucleus  of  the  Marcian 
Library  ;  it  has  also  been  constantly  asserted  that 
the  State  which  accepted  the  precious  legacy  left  it 
to  rot  in  the  packing-cases  that  contained  it.  There 
is  no  truth  in  either  of  these  statements,  though 
there  is  some  justification  for  the  second  in  the 
condition  of  some  books  discovered  two  hundred 
and  fifty  years  later,  and  erroneously  believed  to  be 
Petrarch's.  After  his  death,  the  Republic  was 
either  unable  to  claim  her  inheritance  or  indifferent 
to  it,  and  the  real  nucleus  of  the  Marcian  Library 
is  the  collection  bequeathed  by  Cardinal  Bessarion 


242      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

in  the  following  century.  Petrarch's  books  were 
probably  dispersed  soon  after  his  death  ;  somehow 
or  other  a  good  many  of  them  found  their  way  to 
Gian-Galeazzo's  library  at  Pavia,  and  most  of  these 
are  probably  now  in  Paris  ;  others  are  to  be  found 
in  various  Continental  libraries. 

In  September,  Innocent  VI  died.  For  his  suc- 
cessor, the  Cardinals  went  outside  their  own  body, 
and  chose  the  Abbot  Guillaume  Grimoard,  of 
Marseilles.  Frenchmen  now  formed  the  majority 
of  the  Sacred  College.  The  new  Pope  was  a 
Frenchman,  supposed  to  have  a  special  attachment 
to  his  country.  Everything  seemed  to  point  to  the 
definite  establishment  of  the  Papal  See  at  Avignon, 
but  a  story  related  by  Villani  credits  Grimoard 
before  his  election  with  the  wish  to  return  to  Rome 
and  to  deliver  Italy  from  her  tyrants.  Whether 
there  is  any  foundation  for  this  story  or  not,  the 
new  Pope  certainly  took  the  earliest  opportunity  to 
give  a  hint  of  possible  change  ;  he  was  proclaimed 
by  the  name  of  Urban  V.  Joyfully  Petrarch  hailed 
the  omen  ;  that  the  immediate  offer  of  the  secretary- 
ship proved  the  new  Pope  personally  favourable  to 
him  was  least  among  the  causes  of  his  gratification. 
With  enthusiasm  he  spoke  of  "this  most  holy, 
liberal,  and  truly  urbane  Father,  raised  to  the 
highest  place  of  human  dignity  by  the  express  will 
of  God,  for  the  comfort  of  all  good  men,  and  the 
rescue  of  the  world." 

The  story  of  1363  is  again  an  almost  unbroken 
record  of  deaths.  Its  one  happy  episode  is  Boc- 
caccio's three  months'  visit  to  Venice  in  the  summer. 


THE    SECOND    PLAGUE  243 

He  brought  Leonzio  Pilato  with  him,  and  we  can 
imagine  the  zest  with  which  the  friends  must  have 
discussed  the  teaching  of  Greek.  Hardly  had 
Boccaccio  left  when  the  hand  of  death  fell  aeain 
heavily  on  the  diminished  circle  of  Petrarch's 
friends.  In  this  sad  year  the  plague  took  from 
him  Laelius,  the  last  survivor  of  the  Lombez- 
Avignon  group,  Barbato,  whose  friendship  with 
him  dated  from  the  triumphant  year  of  his  corona- 
tion, and — last-known,  but  perhaps  best-beloved  of 
all,  save  only  Socrates — Francesco  Nelli,  his  dear 
Simoni'des,  for  twelve  years  the  sympathetic  re- 
cipient of  all  his  confidences.  "  You  alone  are  left 
to  me  of  all  my  friends,"  he  cries,  in  his  agony,  to 
Boccaccio,  and  the  words  were  almost  literally  true. 
Guido  Settimo  and  Philip  de  Cabassoles  were  the 
only  exceptions,  and  it  does  not  appear  that  either 
of  them  was  personally  known  as  yet  to  Boccaccio. 


CHAPTER   XVI 

THE    MASTER   AND   HIS   PUPILS- 
VENICE,    PADUA,  AND   PAVIA 

1364-1367 

PETRARCH  had  not  yet  completed  his  sixtieth 
year,  but  already  he  must  be  counted  an  old 
man.  In  some  respects  the  second  plague  made  an 
even  g-reater  chancre  in  his  life  than  the  first :  after 
1363  he  made  no  new  friendships  of  the  old  in- 
timate kind  with  men  of  his  own  age.  The  nearest 
approach  to  such  a  new  tie  was  the  ripening  of  his 
acquaintance  with  Francesco  Bruno,  the  new  Papal 
Secretary,  into  a  feeling  of  warm  attachment  and 
regard.  It  is  evident  that  the  longer  Petrarch  knew 
Bruno,  the  better  he  liked  and  trusted  him.  But  the 
word  friendship  covers  many  degrees  in  the  scale  of 
human  sentiment,  and  though  Petrarch  and  Bruno 
were  friends  in  no  mere  conventional  sense,  they 
never  met  in  the  flesh  ;  however  intimate  might 
be  their  knowledge  of  each  other's  minds — and 
Petrarch  testifies  that  it  was  very  intimate  indeed — 
they  could  never  be  on  those  terms  of  more  than 
brotherly  affection  which  we  have  learnt  to  associate 
with  the  names  of  Socrates,  Lselius,  and  Simonides. 
For  the  rest,  the  names  which  crop  up  for  the  first 
time  in  the  Letters  written  in  Old  Age  are  chiefly 

244 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS    245 

those  of  scholars  with  whom  Petrarch  exchanged 
the  courtesies  of  their  common  calling,  or  men  of  a 
younger  generation,  some  of  them  his  pupils  in 
literature,  others  the  sons  of  old  friends. 

The  later  letters  accurately  reflect  the  changed 
condition  of  their  writer's  life.  They  contain  a  much 
larger  proportion  of  treatises  and  disquisitions  than 
the  earlier  collection  ;  of  really  "  familiar "  letters 
there  are  comparatively  few.  One  long  and  delight- 
ful letter  of  reminiscences  addressed  to  Guido 
Settimo  is  our  principal  authority  for  the  events 
of  Petrarch's  early  years.  There  are  half  a  dozen 
addressed  to  Philip  de  Cabassoles,  which  show  that 
neither  long  absence,  nor  Philip's  promotion,  first 
to  the  Patriarchate  of  Jerusalem  and  then  to  the 
Cardinalate,  could  weaken  the  ties  contracted  in 
the  intimacy  of  Vaucluse.  Best  of  all,  there  is  a 
whole  series  of  letters  to  Boccaccio,  which  prove 
that  Petrarch  had  at  least  one  friend  left  with  whom 
there  need  be  no  shadow  of  concealment. 

If  he  did  not  contract  new  friendships,  still  less 
was  he  likely  to  take  up  new  themes  or  attack  the 
solution  of  new  problems.  The  interests  of  his 
earlier  years  were  enough  to  fill  the  lives  of  half  a 
dozen  ordinary  men  ;  they  could  still  satisfy  even 
his  appetite  for  work,  and  there  is  not  a  sign  of 
slackening  in  the  ardour  with  which  he  pursued 
them.  Still  we  may  note  that  the  last  decade  of 
his  life  is  a  time  of  strenuous  diligence  on  the  old 
lines,  not  of  any  effort  to  strike  out  new  ones. 

One  change  observable  in  his  habits  was  entirely 
for  the  better  :  Venice  now  counted  for  much  more, 


246     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

and  Milan  for  much  less  in  his  life.  His  attach- 
ment to  the  republic  was  of  recent  growth.  Only- 
ten  years  before  he  had  been  a  strong  partisan  of 
Genoa,  and  had  written  to  Guido  Settimo,  then 
Archdeacon  and  on  the  point  of  being  made  Arch- 
bishop of  that  city,  a  letter  in  which  he  identified 
himself  with  the  Genoese,  and  spoke  of  the  Vene- 
tians as  a  "haughty  and  implacable  foe."  Next  he 
did  his  best  both  by  letter  and  as  the  Visconti's 
ambassador  to  bring  about  peace  between  the  two 
great  maritime  states.  From  the  first  Venice  treated 
him  with  such  distinguished  honour  as  must  have 
inclined  him  favourably  towards  her.  Presently 
came  the  revolution,  by  which,  after  three  years' 
subjection,  Genoa  shook  off  the  yoke  of  Milan : 
Petrarch's  personal  friendship  with  Guido  was  now 
the  only  tie  that  connected  him  with  Genoa,  and 
there  could  be  no  shadow  of  reason  why  he  should 
not  cultivate  closer  relations  with  Venice.  These 
were  facilitated  by  his  friendship  with  Benintendi 
de'  Ravegnani,  Chancellor  of  the  Republic.  He 
accepted  her  invitation  to  write  Andrea  Dan- 
dolo's  epitaph,  paid  her  frequent  visits,  and  at 
last,  as  we  have  seen,  gave  her  the  reversion 
of  his  library,  and  accepted  the  usufruct  of  a 
house  as  a  mark  of  her  gratitude.  It  was  not 
surprising  that  Venice  in  these  days  of  her 
early  greatness  should  cast  over  him  the  spell 
which  for  six  hundred  years  has  charmed  the  im- 
agination of  men.  There  was  a  good  old  Roman 
ring  about  the  word  Republic  which  always  appealed 
to  him  ;  and  here  was  a  republic  which  embodied 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS    247 

his  ideas  in  the  stability  of  her  institutions,  and 
gratified  his  taste  by  the  dignified  splendour  of  her 
civic  life.  He  speaks  of  her  as  "that  most  august 
city  of  Venice,  the  one  remaining  home  of  liberty, 
peace,  and  justice,  the  one  refuge  left  to  good  men, 
the  one  harbour  where  the  ships  of  those  who 
desire  to  live  worthily  may  still  find  shelter  when 
battered  by  the  storms  of  tyranny  and  war.  'Tis  a 
city  rich  in  gold,  but  richer  in  repute ;  powerful  in 
her  resources,  more  powerful  in  her  worth ;  built  on 
a  solid  foundation  of  marble,  and  established  on  the 
yet  more  solid  base  of  civic  concord  ;  girt  with  the 
salt  of  the  waves,  and  safeguarded  by  the  still 
better  salt  of  good  counsel."  To  modern  ears, 
indeed,  it  may  sound  a  little  strange  to  speak  of  the 
Venetian  oligarchy  as  the  one  defender  of  liberty  ; 
and  when  we  read  of  the  "civic  concord"  that 
prevailed  in  Venice,  we  cannot  help  remembering 
that  she  had  very  recently  beheaded  a  doge.  But 
once  again  it  must  be  remembered  that  by  liberty 
Petrarch  means  the  people's  assent  to  the  form  of 
their  government,  not  their  participation  in  its  work- 
ing; and  the  suppression  of  Marino  Faliero's  puerile 
conspiracy  might  well  be  regarded  as  a  testimony  to 
the  strength  of  the  Venetian  Constitution,  not  as 
evidence  of  any  weakness  inherent  in  it. 

Not  that  he  broke  with  the  Visconti ;  far  from  it. 
Only  from  this  time  he  appears  in  the  character  of 
Galeazzo's  personal  friend,  rather  than  as  a  client  of 
the  family.  He  was  as  deeply  interested  as  ever 
in  the  politics  of  Milan  as  part  of  the  general 
politics   of   Italy ;    and   when   a   new  papal  envoy, 


248     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Cardinal  Androuin  de  la  Roche,  came  to  treat  for 
peace  between  Bernabo  Visconti  and  the  Church, 
Petrarch  waited  on  him  at  Bologna.  His  visit  was 
probably  paid  just  before  the  conclusion  of  the 
Peace  of  Lombardy,  by  which  Bernabo  Visconti 
waived  his  claim  to  the  possession  of  Bologna  on 
condition  that  Androuin,  not  Albornoz,  should  be 
deputed  by  the  Holy  See  to  govern  it. 

The  sight  of  Bologna  distressed  Petrarch  sadly ; 
he  had  known  it  as  a  peaceful  and  opulent  univer- 
sity town ;  now  it  had  been  for  some  years  the 
bone  of  contention  between  rival  armies,  and  the 
result  to  both  university  and  city  was  deplorable ; 
"  it  looked  just  like  a  hungry  desert." 

He  seems  to  have  spent  Lent  and  Easter,  as  was 
now  his  habit,  at  Padua ;  in  May  we  find  him  once 
more  in  Venice.  The  Venetians  were  now  busy 
with  their  expedition  to  Crete,  which  was  in  full 
rebellion  against  their  authority.  The  Peace  of 
Lombardy  enabled  them  to  offer  the  command  of 
their  forces  to  Luchino  del  Verme,  one  of  the  most 
celebrated  condottieri  of  the  day.  For  some  years 
Luchino  had  been  Galeazzo's  Captain-General,  and 
the  Milanese  successes  against  the  Marquis  of  Mont- 
ferrat  must  be  credited  to  his  skill  in  leadership. 
The  peace  threw  him  out  of  work,  and  Petrarch, 
apparently  at  the  instance  of  the  Doge  Lorenzo 
Celso,  wrote  him  a  letter  congratulating  him  on  the 
offer  of  the  Cretan  command,  and  urging  him  to 
accept  it ;  to  this  practical  exhortation  he  added 
some  five  folio  pages  of  disquisition  on  the  qualities 
of  a  great  general,  as  illustrated  by  instances  from 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS    249 

history.  Luchino  accepted  the  command,  was 
solemnly  sworn  in,  and  sailed  from  Venice  on 
April  loth;  less  than  two  months  afterwards  arrived 
the  news  of  a  decisive  victory.  On  June  4th 
Petrarch  was  standing  with  his  friend  and  guest, 
the  Archbishop  of  Patras,  at  the  window  of  his 
house  on  the  Riva  degli  Schiavoni,  when  he  saw  a 
galley  making  at  full  speed  for  the  harbour  ;  her 
oars  were  wreathed  with  garlands,  and  on  the  prow 
stood  a  band  of  youths  crowned  with  laurel  and 
waving  flags;  evidently  she  brought  news  of  victory. 
The  sentinel  in  the  watch-tower  o-ave  the  sigrnal 
that  a  ship  from  abroad  was  entering  the  port.  The 
people  flocked  down  to  the  quays,  and  soon  all 
Venice  had  heard  the  joyful  news  that,  almost  with- 
out loss  to  her  own  army,  the  enemy  had  been 
routed,  the  Venetian  captives  liberated,  the  rebel 
fortresses  surrendered,  and  the  whole  island  reduced 
to  submission.  Then  Venice  showed  the  world 
how  a  great  nation  rejoices  in  a  great  triumph.  A 
huge  procession  followed  the  Doge  and  chief  officers 
of  state  to  a  solemn  thankscjivincr  in  St.  Mark's, 
and  then  paraded  the  Great  Square.  Games  and 
sports  followed ;  the  square  was  packed  so  close 
that  it  seemed  as  if  the  whole  people  must  be  met 
together,  but  in  all  this  throng  "  there  was  not  a 
sign  of  tumult  or  disorder  or  quarrelling  ;  the  city 
was  full  of  joy  and  thankfulness,  of  harmony  and 
love ;  and  while  magnificence  ruled  supreme,  modesty 
and  sobriety  were  not  banished  from  her  kingdom." 
Two  months  later,  when  the  victorious  (general  had 
returned    with    his    troops,    the    celebrations    were 


250     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

renewed  on  a  still  more  elaborate  scale  ;  four  whole 
days  were  devoted  to  a  magnificent  spectacle,  of 
which  the  chief  features  were  an  equestrian  display 
by  twenty-four  young  Venetian  nobles,  and  a  tourna- 
ment in  which  Venetians  and  foreign  guests  of  the 
republic  took  part  together.  Among  the  jousters 
were  included  some  Englishmen  of  high  rank, 
members  of  King  Edward's  Court  and  family,  who 
had  come  by  sea  to  Venice  a  few  days  before. 
The  Doge  witnessed  the  spectacle  from  the  marble 
platform  behind  the  bronze  horses  of  St.  Mark,  and 
for  two  days  out  of  the  four  Petrarch  sat  in  a  place 
of  honour  at  his  right  hand.  He  was  invited, 
indeed,  to  attend  the  whole  performance,  but  excused 
himself  for  the  other  two  days  on  the  ground  of  his 
well-known  occupations. 

In  the  following  year,  as  we  learn  from  the 
Florentine  historian,  Scipione  Ammirato,  the 
Republic  of  Florence  asked  the  Pope  to  confer 
on  Petrarch  a  canonry  either  in  her  own  Church,  or 
in  that  of  Fiesole.  The  object  of  the  request  was, 
of  course,  to  induce  Petrarch  to  take  up  his  resi- 
dence in  Florence,  but  nothing  came  of  the  pro- 
posal. The  Pope,  however,  had  his  own  plan  for 
attracting  Petrarch  back  to  Provence,  and  nomi- 
nated him  to  a  canonry  at  Carpentras.  But  before 
the  presentation  was  actually  made,  a  false  report  of 
the  poet's  death  was  circulated  in  Avignon,  and 
universally  believed.  Petrarch  hints  that  this 
report,  and  many  others  of  the  same  kind,  were  set 
about  by  the  malice  of  a  personal  enemy.  If  this 
was  the  case,  the  lie  for  once  succeeded  in  doing  its 


THE   MASTER   AND   HIS   PUPILS    251 

victim  a  mischief,  for  before  the  error  could  be 
rectified,  Urban  had  conferred  all  Petrarch's  bene- 
fices on  others.  Those  which  he  had  actually  held 
were  of  course  restored  to  him  as  soon  as  he 
was  found  to  be  alive  ;  but  as  he  had  never  been 
formally  presented  to  the  canonry  of  Carpentras,  it 
remained  with  its  new  possessor.  It  is  doubtful 
whether  Petrarch  very  much  regretted  the  loss  of  it. 
He  had  been  gratified  by  the  spontaneous  mark  of 
Urban  s  goodwill,  and  especially  by  the  considerate 
thouohtfulness  of  a  grift  which  would  have  brought 
him  back  to  the  nei^rhbourhood  of  Vaucluse  and 
Philip  de  Cabassoles  ;  all  this  he  warmly  acknow- 
ledged in  a  subsequent  letter  to  Bruno.  But  as  years 
went  on  he  became  steadily  less  inclined  to  leave 
Italy ;  and  when  at  last,  to  his  exceeding  joy, 
Urban  brought  the  papacy  back  to  Rome,  he  could 
declare  with  evident  sincerity  that  the  good  Pope's 
blessing  was  the  only  favour  that  he  desired  of 
him. 

The  chronology  of  these  years  is  not  quite  clear ; 
the  letters  belonging  to  them  are  certainly  not 
placed  in  exact  order  of  composition,  and  Fracas- 
setti  assigns  to  1364-5  some  events  which  in  this 
narrative  are  placed  a  year  later.  But  the  matter  is 
one  of  curiosity  rather  than  of  importance.  The 
general  tenor  of  Petrarch's  life  throughout  the 
period  is  clear  enough. 

It  was  probably  in  the  summer  of  this  year  that 
he  first  took  up  his  residence  in  Pavia.  That  town 
had  now  been  for  six  years  in  the  power  of  Galeazzo 
Visconti.     For  a  short  time,  indeed,  it  had  seemed 


252      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

as  though  Bussolari  might  succeed  in  his  heroic 
attempt  to  found  a  state  on  the  principles  of 
morality  and  freedom,  but  the  powers  of  evil  were 
too  strong.  The  Beccaria,  acting  as  Galeazzo's 
jackals,  made  themselves  masters  of  the  surround- 
ing country.  Pavia  was  closely  besieged,  and 
though  Montferrat  made  many  attempts  to  relieve 
it,  only  a  single  convoy  got  through.  In  October, 
1359,  hunger  produced  the  usual  pestilence,  and 
Bussolari  saw  that  he  must  yield.  With  his  own 
hand  he  drew  up  the  terms  of  capitulation,  by  which 
Galeazzo  agreed  to  respect  the  new  Constitution, 
and  maintain  the  people  in  full  enjoyment  of  their 
liberties.  For  himself,  Bussolari  asked  not  so  much 
as  a  safe-conduct ;  his  concern  was  for  the  people, 
and  he  had  absolutely  no  thought  for  his  own  safety. 
Galeazzo  signed  the  treaty,  and  it  is  superfluous 
to  add  that  he  broke  it.  By  inducing  Bussolari's 
superiors  to  keep  the  friar  in  strict  monastic  con- 
finement, which  soon  ended  in  his  death,  Galeazzo 
did  not  indeed  commit  any  breach  of  faith  ;  he  only 
gave  the  expected  measure  of  Visconti  generosity. 
To  the  citizens  of  Pavia  he  was  both  mean  and 
treacherous.  The  liberties  which  he  had  sworn  to 
maintain  were  at  once  destroyed,  and  his  breach  of 
faith  was  made  worse  by  his  subornation  of  servile 
lawyers  to  furnish  him  with  a  pretext  for  its  justifi- 
cation. One  thingr  he  did  for  Pavia  :  he  brouo-ht 
money  into  the  place.  The  Milanese  historian 
Corio  says  that  his  wife  and  family  persuaded  him 
to  leave  Milan,  lest  Bernabo,  in  one  of  his  frenzies, 
should   offer  him  violence  ;  whether  this   were  his 


l\< 


THE   MASTER  AND   HTS   PUPILS    253 

motive  or  not — and  Bernabo  in  a  frenzy  was  cer- 
tainly a  pers(Mi  to  be  avoided-  Galeazzo  left  Milan 
in  1360,  and  built  himself  a  magnificent  palace- 
castle  in  Pavia.  Petrarch  was  always  welcome  at 
his  Court,  and  from  1365  onwards  we  find  him 
making  a  practice  of  spending  the  late  summer  and 
autumn  there,  and  sometimes  prolonging  his  visit  to 
the  end  of  the  year. 

This  period  is  rich  in  letters  to  Boccaccio.  One 
of  these  gives  us  a  glimpse  of  the  Italian  minstrels 
who  went  about  singing  and  reciting  the  composi- 
tions of  well-known  poets.  These,  if  Petrarch's 
description  is  to  be  trusted,  ranked  far  below  the 
jongleurs  of  Provence.  The  latter,  though  not  to 
be  confounded  with  the  courtly  poets  known  as 
troubadours,  were  as  often  as  not  the  authors  of 
the  compositions  which  they  sang  or  recited.  But 
the  Italian  minstrels  are  characterised  by  Petrarch 
as  "  men  of  no  great  parts,  but  with  great  powers  of 
memory,  great  industry,  and  still  greater  impudence, 
who  frequent  the  halls  of  kings  and  great  men,  with 
not  a  raor  of  their  own  to  cover  their  nakedness, 

O 

but  tricked  out  in  the  trappings  of  other  men's 
songs,  and  who  earn  noblemen's  favour  by  their 
declamatory  recitations  of  this  or  that  man's  best 
compositions,  especially  of  such  as  are  written  in 
the  vulgar  tongue."  Naturally  these  reciters  were 
for  ever  pestering  Petrarch  for  a  copy  of  his  latest 
poem.  In  his  early  days  he  was  in  the  habit  of 
gratifying  them,  but  presently  took  a  disgust  at  their 
importunity,  and  not  only  refused  all  their  applica- 
tions, but  would  not  so  much  as  see  the  applicants. 


254     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

Occasionally,  however,  he  received  visits  of  thanks 
from  men  whom  he  had  formerly  sent  away  starving 
and  in  rags  with  a  poem  to  recite,  and  who  now 
came  back  well  fed  and  clad  in  silk  to  assure  him 
that  his  kindness  had  saved  them  from  utter  poverty. 
This  made  him  consider  the  Qrrantinor  of  their 
requests  to  be  a  kind  of  alms-giving,  and  he  would 
often  relax  his  rule  of  refusal,  especially  in  favour 
of  those  whom  he  knew  to  be  poor  and  honest. 
When  he  had  speech  of  these  men,  he  would  ask 
them  why  they  plagued  him  with  all  their  importuni- 
ties, and  especially  why  they  did  not  go  and  give 
Boccaccio  a  turn.  One  day  he  got  an  answer  which 
throws  a  charming  light  on  the  foibles  which  almost 
equally  with  his  great  qualities  make  Boccaccio  dear 
to  us,  and  on  the  complete  frankness  with  which  he 
and  Petrarch  spoke  and  wrote  to  each  other.  It  was 
no  use  going  to  Boccaccio,  it  seems,  for  Boccaccio 
was  in  a  huff;  he  was  no  poet,  he  said  ;  Dante  and 
Petrarch  were  your  only  poets,  and  no  one  else  need 
apply  for  the  title.  It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  for 
a  single  moment  Boccaccio  allowed  himself  to  be 
jealous  of  the  reputation  of  those  whom  he  thus 
exalted  above  himself.  He  did  not  claim  to  be  put  on 
a  level  with  his  two  great  masters ;  it  was  Petrarch 
who  rightly  told  him  that  his  place  was  by  their 
side.  But  Boccaccio,  like  all  impulsive  men,  had 
his  fits  of  depression.  Poverty  pressed  hard  on  him, 
and  he  was  amply  justified  in  feeling  now  and  then 
that  the  fruits  of  his  genius  and  industry  deserved 
more  than  they  received  in  the  way  of  material 
reward,  and  perhaps  of  reputation  too.      In  such  a 


THE   MASTER   AND   HIS   PUPILS    255 

mood,  which  we  may  be  sure  was  only  transitory, 
he  was  for  throwing  his  Italian  poems  into  the  fire. 
What  was  the  use  of  keeping  this  stuff,  when  Italy 
had  the  Divina  Co7n7nedia  and  the  Canzoniere  ? 
Petrarch's  reproof  is  at  once  sensible  and  affection- 
ate. He  tells  Boccaccio  about  an  old  man  of 
Ravenna,  who  was  no  mean  judge  of  poetry,  and 
who  always  put  Dante  first,  Petrarch  himself  second, 
and  Boccaccio  third  among  the  poets  of  Italy.  For 
his  own  part  Petrarch  accepts  the  verdict ;  but  if 
Boccaccio  thinks  he  ought  to  have  second  place,  it 
is  entirely  at  his  service  ;  there  can  be  no  quarrels 
for  precedence  between  them.  If  such  a  thing  were 
possible,  it  would  mean  that  their  friendship  was 
incomplete  ;  for  his  own  part  Petrarch  would  rather 
rank  Boccaccio  above  himself  than  below,  and  he 
remembers  old  sayings  by  his  friend  which  show  a 
reciprocal  affection.  The  thing  that  really  matters 
is  not  relative  position,  but  excellence  of  work,  and 
if  any  one  still  remains  ahead  of  him  in  the  race, 
let  Boccaccio  take  it  as  an  incentive  to  go  on  work- 
ing his  hardest  and  producing  his  best.  That  is  the 
kind  of  goad  which  stimulates  a  noble  mind  to  win 
astonishing  success.  Boccaccio  indeed  has  a  legiti- 
mate orrievance  aoainst  this  io-norant  and  conceited 
000 

generation,  which  is  incapable  of  appreciating  such 
work  as  his.  He  may  well  have  a  mind  to  with- 
draw it  from  so  incompetent  a  tribunal ;  but  let  him 
hold  his  hand,  and  remember  that  in  the  realm  of 
high  learning  he  may  always  take  refuge  from  the 
vulgarities  and  ineptitudes  of  the  day. 

In  the  autumn  of  1365  Boccaccio  went  to  Avig- 


256      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

non  as  the  spokesman  of  an  important  Florentine 
embassy  to  the  Pope.  He  returned  early  in  De- 
cember by  sea  to  Genoa,  and  Petrarch  hoped  that 
he  might  come  thence  to  pay  him  a  visit  at  Pavia, 
but  Boccaccio  was  obliged  to  go  straight  home  to 
Florence.  He  wrote  Petrarch  an  account  of  his 
stay  at  Avignon  and  an  expression  of  his  regret  at 
not  being  able  to  visit  him ;  in  reply  Petrarch  sent 
a  long  letter  dated  from  Pavia  on  December  14th, 
in  which  he  alludes  with  special  pleasure  to  Boc- 
caccio's account  of  his  first  meeting  with  Philip,  de 
Cabassoles.  "Greatly  do  I  rejoice,"  he  writes, 
"that  in  Babylon  itself  you  saw  those  few  friends 
whom  death  has  spared  me,  and  above  all  that 
veritable  father  of  mine,  Philip,  Patriarch  of  Jeru- 
salem, a  man,  to  describe  him  in  a  brief  phrase, 
altogether  worthy  of  the  dignity  to  which  he  has 
attained,  and  not  unworthy  to  attain  to  that  of 
Rome,  if  ever  the  turn  of  events  should  bring  him 
the  office  for  which  his  merits  fit  him.  Though  he 
had  never  seen  you  before,  he  welcomed  you  as  my 
second  self,  you  tell  me,  embracing  you  long  and 
tenderly  with  sincere  affection  in  the  presence  of  the 
Pope  himself,  and  under  the  eyes  of  the  Cardinals, 
and  after  loving  kisses  and  pleasant  conversation, 
with  anxious  inquiries  about  my  welfare,  he  begged 
that  I  would  send  him  presently  my  book  On  the 
Solitary  Life,  which  I  wrote  years  ago  in  his  own 
country  district,  when  he  was  Bishop  of  the  diocese 
of  Cavaillon,  and  dedicated  to  him.  In  truth  he 
asks  what  is  only  fair,  since  I  have  really  finished 
that   little    treatise ;    but    I   call    God,   who   knows 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS   257 

everything,  to  witness  that  ten  times  at  least  I  have 
tried  and  tried  again  to  send  him  the  writing  in 
such  a  state  that,  however  much  its  composition 
might  fail  to  satisfy  the  reader's  ears  and  intel- 
ligence, at  least  its  penmanship  should  be  pleasing 
to  his  eye.  But  every  attempt  to  carry  out  my 
wish  has  been  frustrated  by  the  obstacle  of  which  I 
am  always  complaining.  You  know  just  what  value 
to  set  on  a  copyist's  trustworthiness  and  diligence  ; 
they  are  not  the  least  of  the  plagues  which  afflict 
your  talented  writer.  And  so,  incredible  as  it 
sounds,  this  book  which  was  written  in  a  few  months 
has  never  got  copied  in  all  these  years."  The 
treatise  was  actually  copied  soon  after,  and  sent  to 
Philip  in  1366. 

The  same  letter,  like  many  others  which  precede 
and  follow  it,  contains  a  reference  to  the  Greek 
Leonzio  Pilato  and  the  Latin  translation  of  Homer 
which  Petrarch  had  commissioned  him  to  make. 
The  story  of  Leonzio  is  a  veritable  tragi-comedy. 
He  was  born  in  Calabria,  but  when  in  Italy  passed 
himself  off  as  a  native  of  Thessalonica  ;  in  Greece 
it  pleased  him  to  boast  of  his  Italian  origin.  Boc- 
caccio had  picked  him  up  on  the  journey  from 
Venice  to  Avignon,  and  persuaded  him  to  come 
back  with  him  and  teach  Greek  in  Florence. 
Leonzio  claimed  to  be  a  disciple  of  Barlaam,  but 
not  much  reliance  could  be  placed  on  any  account 
that  he  gave  of  himself.  Doubt  has  even  been 
thrown  on  his  qualifications  as  a  teacher  of  Greek, 
but  Boccaccio  certainly  regarded  him  as  thoroughly 
proficient  in  the  language  and  conversant  with  its 
s 


258      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

literature.  By  his  influence  in  Florence,  he  man- 
aged to  get  a  chair  of  Greek  founded  specially  that 
Leonzio  might  fill  it,  and,  poor  as  he  was,  took 
private  lessons  from  him,  and  so  supplemented  his 
professional  income.  Petrarch  too  took  a  share  in 
contributing  to  Leonzio's  maintenance ;  he  had 
heard  with  enthusiasm  of  Boccaccio's  scheme  for 
establishing  a  chair  of  Greek,  and  eagerly  seized 
the  opportunity  of  commissioning  the  new  professor 
to  make  a  Latin  translation  of  Homer.  Hitherto 
there  had  been  nothing  of  the  kind  ;  to  persons 
ignorant  of  Greek,  Homer  could  be  known  only 
through  a  sort  of  compendium,  so  badly  compiled 
that  its  faultiness  was  apparent  on  the  face  of  it, 
even  to  students  wholly  ignorant  of  the  original. 
Now,  thought  Petrarch  and  Boccaccio,  was  the  op- 
portunity for  getting  a  really  good  translation,  and 
Petrarch  gladly  undertook  to  bear  the  whole  ex- 
pense, if  he  might  have  the  pleasure  of  putting  the 
book  on  the  shelves  of  his  library.  After  many 
delays  and  repeated  anxious  inquiries,  the  precious 
volumes  at  length  arrived,  and  were  installed 
in  their  place  of  honour  in  February,  1366;  but 
before  the  translation  reached  its  purchaser,  the 
translator  had  come  by  a  strange  end  ;  it  seemed  as 
if  the  fates  had  ordained  him  a  death  to  match  the 
extravagant  oddities  of  his  life.  Whatever  his 
merits  as  a  professor,  Leonzio  could  not  be  pro- 
nounced a  social  success.  In  appearance  he  was  a 
grotesque  little  man  with  preternaturally  hideous 
features,  cOarse  rusty-black  hair,  and  a  beard  of 
enormous  length.     His  habits  were  not  nice ;  and 


THE   MASTER   AND   HIS   PUPILS   259 

Petrarch  says  that  he  wrote  letters  longer  and 
dirtier  than  his  beard.  In  character  he  could  only 
be  compared  to  the  troll  in  the  fairy  story,  whose 
caprice  showed  itself  in  perpetual  discontent  with 
the  conditions  of  his  existence,  and  grumblings  at 
the  people  who  were  kind  to  him.  While  he  was  in 
Italy,  Greece  was  the  only  land  for  decent  folk  to 
live  in.  No  sooner  had  he  disregarded  Petrarch's 
and  Boccaccio's  advice,  and  betaken  himself  to 
Greece,  than  he  was  begging  them  to  have  him 
back  in  Italy.  Petrarch  at  least  had  had  enough 
of  him,  and  left  the  letters  unanswered;  but  Leonzio, 
who  must  have  been  a  pretty  shrewd  judge  of 
character,  felt  sure  that  he  would  not  be  turned 
away  if  he  presented  himself  as  a  suppliant  in  the 
house  which  for  three  months  had  endured  him  as  a 
guest.  He  set  sail  from  Constantinople  with  a 
manuscript  of  Sophocles,  or  so  he  said,  as  a  peace- 
offering,  and  got  safely  as  far  as  the  Adriatic,  when 
a  terrific  storm  arose,  and  Leonzio  was  killed  by  a 
flash  of  lightning,  which  struck  the  mast  to  which 
he  was  clinging  for  safety.  So  died  the  first  pro- 
fessor of  Greek  in  a  Western  University. 

From  the  same  series  of  letters  we  find  that 
Boccaccio  was  once  more  anxious  about  his  friend's 
independence.  He  did  not  quite  like  Petrarch's 
long  rhapsody  on  the  beauties  and  amenities  of 
Pavia ;  Galeazzo's  new  palace  might  be  as  fine  as 
Petrarch  painted  it,  but  Boccaccio  could  not  be 
persuaded  that  a  Visconti  castle  was  the  home  of 
liberty.  Petrarch  wrote  at  some  length  to  reassure 
him,  and  this  time  with  better  reason  than  thirteen 


26o     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

years  earlier.  In  1353  he  had  been  nominally  the 
free  guest  of  the  Visconti,  but  it  cannot  be  denied 
that  effectively  he  was  their  client ;  now,  in  1 366, 
though  the  court  phraseology  might  still  designate 
them  his  patrons,  he  was  really  the  independent 
friend  of  Galeazzo. 

In  these  years  we  find  him  increasingly  intimate 
with  men  of  a  younger  generation,  who  were  at 
once  his  pupils  in  literature  and  the  friends  of  his 
old  acre.  Nearest  of  them  all  in  affection,  and 
most  devoted  in  service  to  the  master,  was  Lom- 
bardo  della  Sete,  or  da  Serico,  a  native  of  Padua, 
and  a  frequent  inmate  of  the  household.  He  was 
a  bachelor,  and  lived  a  very  simple,  frugal  life  in  the 
country.  Petrarch  mentions  in  his  will  that  Lom- 
bardo  had  often  neglected  his  own  affairs  to  attend 
to  those  of  his  friend  ;  he  named  him  among  his 
principal  legatees,  and  even  made  him  his  general 
heir,  in  the  event  of  Francesco  da  Brossano  dying 
before  him.  The  tie  between  the  two  was  all  the 
closer  as  Lombardo  was  himself  a  man  of  letters 
and  a  diligent  student ;  he  continued  and  finished 
the  Epitome  of  tJie  Lives  of  IllMstrious  Men,  on 
which  Petrarch  was  engaged  at  the  time  of  his 
death,  and  there  are  extant  two  or  three  treatises  of 
his  own,  one  of  them  evidently  suggested  by  his 
studies  with  Petrarch,  On  the  Praises  of  certain 
Ladies  who  have  won  renown  in  Letters  or  in  Arms. 
Another  friend  and  disciple,  nearer  perhaps  to 
Petrarch  in  age,  but  still  a  good  many  years  his 
junior,  was  the  grammarian  Donato  degli  Albanzani, 
a  native  of  Pratovecchio,  in  the  Casentino  or  upper 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS  PUPILS   261 

valley  of  the  Arno,  and  therefore  called  by  Petrarch 
Apenninlgena.  Boccaccio  speaks  of  Donato  as  a 
poor  man,  but  highly  respected,  and  a  great  friend 
of  his  own.  For  many  years  he  taught  grammar  at 
Venice,  where  he  probably  made  Petrarch's  ac- 
quaintance in  or  about  the  year  1 36 1 .  A  firm  friend- 
ship resulted  ;  Donato  was  an  enthusiastic  admirer 
of  Petrarch's  works,  and  after  the  latter's  death 
published  a  commentary  on  his  Eclogues  and  a 
translation  of  his  Lives  of  Illustrious  Men.  He 
also  translated  Boccaccio's  Lives  of  Illustrious 
Women. 

A  very  eminent  pupil  and  follower  of  Petrarch 
in  literature,  though  perhaps  not  personally  known 
to  him,  was  Coluccio  Salutati,  a  Florentine  by 
birth,  who  while  still  a  boy  accompanied  his  father 
into  exile  at  Bologna,  and  was  educated  there.  A 
lawyer  by  profession,  he  was  in  1368  associated 
with  Bruno  as  joint  papal  secretary,  and  some  years 
later  he  was  recalled  to  Florence  and  appointed 
Chancellor  of  the  Republic.  Distinguished  as  was 
his  official  career,  he  won  far  higher  fame  as  a 
scholar  and  a  Humanist.  Diligently  following  the 
lines  laid  down  by  Petrarch  and  Boccaccio,  he  did 
his  utmost  for  the  emendation  of  corrupt  classical 
texts,  and  made  the  fruitful  suggestion  that  public 
libraries  should  be  instituted  and  trustworthy 
copyists  placed  on  their  staff  He  was  himself  the 
best  Latinist  of  his  day,  and  his  voluminous  original 
works  in  prose  and  verse  were  accounted  master- 
pieces. He  was  also  well  versed  in  Greek,  and 
successful  in  promoting  the  study  of  it. 


262      PETRARCH    AND    HIS  TIMES 

Of  almost  equal  celebrity  with  Coluccio  was  the 
grammarian  Giovanni  da  Ravenna,  whom  the 
former  recommended  to  the  lord  of  that  city, 
Carlo  Malatesta,  in  1404,  as  "having  been  at  one 
time  the  housemate  and  pupil  of  Francesco  Petrarca, 
of  famous  memory,  with  whom  he  lived  for  the 
space  of  nearly  fifteen  years."  There  is  an  intricate 
controversy  as  to  Giovanni's  family  and  the  exact 
details  of  his  life,  but  it  seems  reasonable  to  con- 
clude with  Baldelli  that  he  was  the  staunch  friend 
of  the  Carrara  family,  who  was  successively  a  teacher 
of  grammar  at  Belluno,  at  Udine,  and  perhaps  in 
Venice,  Chancellor  of  the  city  of  Padua,  and 
lecturer  on  Dante  as  well  as  on  classical  literature 
at  Florence.  On  the  other  hand,  Fracassetti  is 
probably  correct  in  discrediting  the  usual  identifica- 
tion of  him  with  the  unnamed  "young  man  of 
Ravenna "  who  was  Petrarch's  pupil  and  private 
secretary  at  this  time.  There  is  no  sufficient  reason 
for  supposing  that  this  young  man's  name  was 
Giovanni,  and  even  if  it  were,  the  possession  of 
so  common  a  Christian  name  would  not  establish 
his  identity  with  the  famous  grammarian.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  is  practically  certain  that,  whereas 
the  grammarian  spent  nearly  fifteen  years  of  his 
youth  in  Petrarch's  house,  the  private  secretary  was 
not  its  inmate  for  more  than  three  or  four. 

He  came  to  him  on  Donato's  recommendation  in 
1364,  a  mere  lad,  but  so  apt  for  his  work,  that  some 
two  years  later  Petrarch  wrote  to  Boccaccio  that  he 
had  found  a  treasure.  The  boy  had  a  prodigious 
memory.     In    eleven    days   he    had   all    Petrarch's 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS   263 

twelve  ecloo^ues  perfectly  by  heart,  and  he  never 
forgot  what  he  had  learnt.  He  was  temperate  in  his 
habits,  not  greedy  of  money,  and  as  keen  to  work 
as  his  master  himself ;  in  a  word,  though  not  above 
eighteen  or  nineteen  years  old,  he  was  already  the 
ideal  pupil  and  private  secretary.  He  was  treated 
as  a  son  of  the  house,  and  for  some  three  years 
he  repaid  Petrarch's  affectionate  kindness  with  fault- 
less diliorence.  His  seems  to  have  been  the  hand 
which  made  the  final  arrangement  of  the  Familiar 
Letters,  and  to  him  was  entrusted  such  work  as 
required  scrupulous  care  and  nice  judgment  in 
scholarship. 

Petrarch  had  found  what  he  had  been  looking  for 
all  these  years,  a  careful  and  trustworthy  copyist. 
But  the  pleasant  relation  was  too  good  to  last.  One 
fine  day  in  1367  the  lad  took  it  into  his  head  that 
he  would  like  to  see  the  world.  Petrarch  was  much 
more  hurt  in  his  affection  than  solicitous  about  the 
loss  to  his  convenience.  He  loved  the  boy,  de- 
lighted in  his  companionship,  anticipated  a  dis- 
tinguished career  for  him  in  literature,  and  had 
believed  him  to  be  singularly  stable  in  character ; 
now  he  thought  him  a  little  wanting  in  gratitude 
and  sadly  deficient  in  steadfastness.  Doubdess  he 
did  not  make  enough  allowance  for  a  young  man's 
natural  wish  to  try  his  fortune  in  the  great  world  ; 
on  the  other  hand,  the  lad  evidently  urged  his  point 
somewhat  unkindly  and  without  regard  for  the 
susceptibilities  of  the  employer  who  had  also  been 
his  friend  and  benefactor.  He  had  his  way,  of 
course.     He  was  for  going  to  Naples  to  see  Virgil's 


264     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

tomb,  to  Calabria,  or  perhaps  to  Constantinople, 
to  learn  Greek.  At  another  time  he  proposed  to 
visit  Avignon.  Whatever  his  ultimate  intention, 
he  actually  crossed  the  Apennines  and  got  to  Pisa. 
Finding  no  ship  there,  and  having  nearly  exhausted 
his  money,  he  recrossed  the  Apennines  and  made 
for  Parma,  where  he  was  nearly  drowned  in  trying 
to  ford  the  river.  A  passer-by  caught  him  by  the 
heel  and  fished  him  out,  and  somehow  or  other 
he  made  his  way,  penniless,  ragged,  and  half  starved, 
to  Petrarch's  house  in  Pavia.  Here  he  found 
Francesco  da  Brossano  at  home,  who  persuaded 
him,  in  spite  of  shame  and  fear,  to  wait  and  see  the 
master.  To  him  he  confessed  his  fault,  and,  of 
course,  Petrarch  took  him  back.  "  I  am  sure  he 
will  not  stay  with  me,"  he  wrote  to  Donato  ;  "he 
will  be  off  again  when  the  impression  of  his  suffer- 
ing has  worn  off,  but  meanwhile  I  am  putting  by  a 
little  journey-money  for  him."  His  prognostication 
came  true.  A  year  later  the  young  man  left  him 
again,  this  time  with  Petrarch's  full  consent.  He 
carried  with  him  a  letter  of  introduction  to  Bruno, 
who  seems  to  have  employed  him  as  a  scribe  in  the 
secretary's  office. 

Happy  as  Petrarch  was  in  seeing  his  work  taken 
up  by  capable  and  eager  pupils,  and  in  the  general 
recognition  of  its  value  throughout  Europe,  it  is  not 
to  be  supposed  that  the  New  Learning  was  accepted 
at  once  and  without  question  by  all  the  minds 
trained  in  other  schools  of  thought.  We  have  seen 
that  Petrarch  had  involved  himself  in  a  rather  un- 
dignified quarrel  with  the  physicians ;  he  was  now 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS  PUPILS   265 

to  have  thrust  on  him  a  similar  conflict  with  that 
sect  of  philosophers  who  claimed  to  base  their 
system  on  the  works  of  Aristotle,  but  who  knew 
their  supposed  master  only  through  the  com- 
mentaries of  the  Arab  Averroes,  which  Michael 
Scott  had  translated  into  Latin.  Nothing  could  be 
more  repugnant  to  Petrarch's  mind  and  conscience 
than  the  method  of  this  school,  which  was  at  once 
narrow  in  its  formalism  and  materialistic  in  its 
tendency.  Certainly  Petrarch  professed  himself  a 
devotee  of  philosophy,  but  the  word  philosopher 
has  many  shades  of  meaning.  Petrarch  took  it  in 
its  literal  and  general  sense  of  a  man  who  loves 
wisdom  ;  he  did  not  conceive  that  in  order  to  claim 
the  title  you  must  have  thought  out  a  coherent 
scheme  of  the  universe.  He  was  content  to  take 
such  philosophical  doctrines  as  pleased  him  from 
any  writer  in  whose  pages  he  found  them,  and  never 
dreamed  of  co-ordinatino-  them  into  a  dogmatic 
system.  In  a  word,  his  philosophy  was  that  of 
a  man  of  letters,  not  of  a  metaphysician  ;  and  as  a 
man  of  letters,  anxious  that  fine  thought  should  be 
expressed  in  fine  style,  he  hated  the  uncouth  forma- 
lism of  the  Averroists,  while  as  a  devout  Christian 
he  held  the  tendency  of  the  school  towards 
materialism  to  be  a  still  viler  abomination.  It  was 
of  the  Averroists  that  he  was  probably  thinking 
when  he  so  frequently  deplored  the  ignorance,  and 
worse  than  ignorance,  prevalent  at  the  universities. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Averroists  were  not  the 
people  to  take  their  correction  mildly.  They  were 
the  dominant  school,   and  who  was  this  writer  of 


266      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

verses  that  he  should  set  himself  up  as  a  judge 
of  thinkers  ?  Of  literature  and  of  history  they  were 
perfectly  ignorant  and  scornfully  contemptuous. 
The  jargon  of  their  scheme  was  the  only  language 
they  regarded,  and  what  could  not  be  expressed  in 
its  formulae,  simply  was  not  knowledge.  Matters 
came  to  a  head  in  1366,  when  four  graceless  young 
men  published  in  Venice  a  mock-solemn  judgment 
to  the  effect  that  Franciscus  Petrarca  was  a  good 
man,  but  uneducated.  It  is  a  sad  pity  that  Petrarch 
took  up  so  silly  a  challenge.  Surely  he,  whom  every 
scholar  in  Europe  acknowledged  for  his  chief  and 
master,  migrht  have  ig-nored  the  offensiveness  of  the 
young  men's  action  and  laughed  at  its  folly ;  but  he 
was  wounded  to  the  quick  both  in  his  self-esteem 
and  in  his  zeal  for  the  honour  of  his  callinof.  He 
answered  the  attack  in  the  treatise,  the  writing 
of  which  occupied  him  for  the  next  two  years,  On 
his  0W71  and  many  other  people  s  ignorance  :  a  work 
which  contains  some  fine  passages,  and  some 
thoughts  entirely  worthy  of  its  title,  but  is  deformed 
by  that  intemperate  vehemence  and  that  note  of 
personal  rancour  which  disfigure  all  Petrarch's  con- 
troversial writings. 

To  help  him  in  the  controversy,  he  tried,  appar- 
ently without  result,  to  enlist  the  pen  of  a  dis- 
tinguished young  friend.  The  Augustinian  friar 
Lulgi  Marsili  was  a  native  of  Florence,  and  either 
there  or  at  Padua,  where  he  received  part  of  his 
education,  he  was  presented  while  still  a  mere  boy 
to  Petrarch.  The  poet,  struck  by  the  lad's  manner 
and  address,  conceived  great  hopes  of  his  future ; 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS    267 

he  welcomed  his  visits,  and  became  more  and  more 
firmly  convinced  that  a  distinguished  career  was  in 
store  for  him.  Keen  must  have  been  the  stimulus 
afforded  by  such  encouragement  to  a  boy  of  brilliant 
talents  and  eager  desire  for  knowledge.  Marsili's 
subsequent  career  justified  the  high  hopes  which 
Petrarch  entertained  of  him  ;  alike  in  Paris  and  in 
Italy  he  was  reputed  one  of  the  foremost  scholars 
of  his  day,  and  Coluccio  Salutati  more  than  once 
paid  him  the  compliment  of  consulting  his  judgment. 
Some  years  passed  between  Petrarch's  first  intimacy 
with  him  and  its  renewal  about  this  period  ;  Marsili 
was  now  a  young  man  of  whom  Petrarch  could  say 
that  he  had  come  back  to  him,  in  Ovid's  words, 
"a  youth  to  manhood  grown,  more  comely  than 
himself"  He  conceived  so  strongr  an  affection  for 
him  that  in  1373  he  gave  him  the  copy  of  St. 
Augustine's  Confessions  which  he  himself  had  re- 
ceived from  Fra  Dionigi  forty  years  earlier,  and 
accompanied  it  with  a  short  letter,  which,  though 
written  in  the  last  year  of  his  life,  may  be  quoted 
here  : — 

"  By  your  leave,  my  friend,  I  should  say  that  my 
services  to  you,  which  you  cite  as  many,  are  nothing 
at  all ;  it  is  merely  that  I  have  loved  you  from  your 
boyhood,  for  even  then  I  had  some  presage  of  what 
was  coming,  and  that  now  I  love  you  better  and 
better  every  day,  now  that  I  have  a  present  hope 
of  finding  in  you  such  a  man  as  I  wish.  Gladly  do 
I  give  you  the  book  for  which  you  ask;  and  I 
would  give  it  yet  more  gladly  if  it  were  still  in  the 
condition  in  which  I  had  it  as  a  gift  in  my  youth 


268      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

from  the  celebrated  Uionysius,  an  eminent  brother 
of  your  Order,  a  man  distinguished  in  learning  and 
every  kind  of  merit,  who  was  a  most  kind  father  to 
me.  But  I  was  in  those  days,  by  disposition  perhaps 
as  well  as  by  my  age,  inclined  to  travel ;  and 
because  this  book  was  very  pleasant  to  me  both  for 
its  matter  and  its  author's  sake,  and  was  also  little 
enough  to  be  easily  handled  and  lightly  carried 
about,  I  took  it  with  me  continually  wellnigh  all 
through  Italy  and  Germany,  so  that  the  book  and 
my  hand  seemed  to  be  almost  of  a  piece,  so  in- 
separable had  they  become  by  constant  companion- 
ship. And,  to  say  nothing  of  other  falls  by  river 
and  land,  I  will  tell  you  of  a  wonderful  adventure 
when  it  went  down  to  the  bottom  of  the  sea  with 
me  off  the  coast  of  Nice,  and  undoubtedly  it  had 
been  all  over  with  us  both  had  not  Christ  plucked 
us  out  of  this  imminent  danger.     So  in  croino"  hither 

o  o  o 

and  thither  with  me  it  has  grown  old,  till  its  old 
pages  have  become  hard  reading  for  old  eyes ;  and 
now  at  last  it  takes  its  way  back  to  the  house 
of  Augustine,  whence  it  came  forth,  and  will  soon 
be  starting  afresh  on  its  travels  with  you,  I  suppose. 
Be  it  your  good  pleasure  then  to  take  it  such  as  it 
is,  and  henceforth  treat  anything  that  I  have  as  at 
your  disposal ;  save  yourself  the  trouble  of  un- 
necessary explanations,  and  take  without  asking 
whatever  pleases  you.  Farewell,  and  may  good 
fortune  be  with  you  ;  and  pray  to  Christ  for  me 
whenever  you  approach  His  table." 

A  pleasant  incident  occurred  near  the  end  of  the 
year  1366.     In  November  Stefano  Colonna,  a  great- 


THE   MASTER  AND   HIS   PUPILS   269 

grandson  of  old  Stefano,  visited  Petrarch  at  Venice 
and  spent  an  afternoon  with  him.  The  old  wound 
was  healed  then,  the  old  dissensions  forgotten,  and 
Petrarch  could  now  write  to  Bruno  of  young  Stefano 
and  young  Agapito  in  terms  that  recall  the  warmth 
of  his  old  affection  for  their  fathers  and  uncles. 


CHAPTER   XVII 

THE   POPE   IN   ROME 

1367-1370 

GREAT  news  came  in  the  spring  of  1367,  news 
that  filled  Petrarch  with  joyful  hope  of  yet 
seeing  the  dawn  of  that  better  era  for  which  he  had 
all  his  life  been  looking  in  vain — the  Pope  was  really 
leaving  Avignon  and  going  back  to  Rome.  It  was 
not  the  full  realisation  of  Petrarch's  ideal,  but  at 
least  it  put  an  end  to  what  he  regarded  as  the  very 
worst  political  evil  of  the  day,  the  exile  of  the 
Papacy.  Rienzi  had  failed  and  Charles  IV  had 
never  tried  to  restore  the  sovereignty  of  Rome  ;  but 
at  least  her  "  second  husband  "  was  now  awake  to 
the  solemn  duties  and  glorious  privileges  of  his 
office ;  at  least  the  Eternal  City  was  once  more  to 
be  the  centre  of  the  world's  spiritual  life.  If  so 
much  could  be  achieved  at  a  blow,  might  not  all  the 
rest  follow  in  due  course  ?  Might  not  the  recogni- 
tion of  Rome's  right  to  be  the  seat  of  Papacy  lead 
men  to  acknowledge  her  equally  valid  right  to  be 
the  seat  of  Empire  ?  It  was  even  rumoured  that  the 
spiritual  and  temporal  sovereigns  of  the  world  had 
arranged  to  meet  within  her  walls ;  might  not  this 
meeting  be  the  prelude  to  their  permanent  joint 
residence  there  ? 

270 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  271 

The  virulence  of  Petrarch's  attacks  on  the  vices 
of  the  Church  and  her  clergy,  and  on  her  establish- 
ment at  Avignon,  which  he  regarded  as  the  root  of 
the  whole  mischief,  has  led  some  historians  to  regard 
him  as  a  foe  to  the  Papacy  itself.  Exultant  Protes- 
tants have  even  claimed  him  as  a  forerunner  of  the 
Reformation.  This  is  to  turn  history  upside  down, 
and  to  interpret  the  fourteenth  century  by  the 
experience  of  the  sixteenth.  The  idea  of  spiritual 
freedom  to  be  attained  and  spiritual  truth  to  be 
upheld  outside  the  Roman  organisation  never 
occurred  to  him  ;  if  by  an  intellectual  miracle  he 
could  have  conceived  Luther's  great  deliverance,  he 
would  have  shrunk  from  it  with  abhorrence ;  it 
would  have  seemed  to  him  to  be  vitiated  at  its  very 
origin  by  the  double  taint  of  ecclesiastical  schism 
and  disloyalty  to  Rome.  But  if  he  was  a  loyal  son 
of  the  Roman  Church,  how,  it  may  be  asked,  could 
he  possibly  attack  her  clergy  and  her  organisation 
as  he  did  ?  There  is  no  minimisino-  the  force  and 
bitterness  of  these  attacks  ;  he  himself  regarded  the 
letters  containing  some  of  them  as  so  dangerous 
that  he  never  acknowledged  their  authorship,  in- 
scribed them  with  no  recipient's  name,  and  kept 
them  strictly  secret  from  all  but  a  few  carefully 
chosen  friends.  Nor  is  this  all ;  outside  the  pages 
of  the  letters  Sine  Titulo,  in  his  acknowledged 
works  and  even  in  his  Italian  poems,  there  are 
denunciations  of  "  Babylon  "  so  fierce  that  they  were 
struck  out  from  all  editions  printed  under  the  juris- 
diction of  the  Curia.  Yet  the  writer  of  them  was 
really  a  papal  idealist,  intent  on  serving  the  Church 


272      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

by  purifying  her,  and  quite  incapable  of  the  idea 
of  quitting  her.  In  penning  these  furious  dia- 
tribes, he  undoubtedly  regarded  himself  as  a 
surgeon  using  the  sharpest  possible  instrument  to 
cut  out  a  cancerous  growth  which  threatened  the 
patient's  very  life.  Nor  did  he  stand  alone  ; 
Catholics  of  unimpeachable  loyalty  shared  his 
views ;  very  eminent  Churchmen  protected  and 
encouraged  him  ;  bishops  and  even  cardinals  were 
among  the  chosen  few  to  whom  the  letters  Sine 
Titulo  were  shown. 

At  last,  it  seemed,  the  Pope  himself  was  con- 
vinced, and  Petrarch  might  not  unreasonably  claim 
to  have  had  a  share  in  the  work  of  convincing  him. 
Urban  was  the  third  Pope  to  whom  he  had  ad- 
dressed his  impassioned  appeal  for  justice  to  Rome. 
To  Benedict  XII  he  had  written  a  couple  of 
poetical  Latin  letters ;  to  Clement  VI  he  had  ad- 
dressed a  rhetorical  poem  which  Rossetti  believes 
to  have  been  spoken  as  a  harangue  on  the  occasion 
of  Rienzi's  embassy:  now  in  1366,  while  Urban 
still  seemed  established  at  Avignon,  he  sent  him  a 
long  prose  letter — rather,  perhaps,  we  may  call  it 
a  treatise  and  an  exhortation — which  is  one  of  the 
most  interesting  of  his  political  writings.  The  form 
of  these  appeals  to  successive  Popes  varies,  but 
their  tenor  is  always  the  same  :  the  sorrowful 
"  widowhood  "  of  Rome,  the  pity  of  it,  the  shame 
of  it,  and  the  glory  awaiting  the  servant  of  God 
who  shall  ricrht  her  wrong- — such  is  the  theme  of 
them  all ;  and  not  of  them  only,  for  the  letters  to 
Rienzi  and  to  Charles  IV  bewail  the  same  misery, 


VRBANVS  V. 

saco  GaJliis^  ere  at 
13(^2., Se.dit  ann,S. 
ijt  die  ic^Deceinh- 


Guillehniis  de  Gri  -. 
ie  zZ'^ctchr.  an. 
mens. 1. dies  Z3  Ch 
an.ijyoyS.  d.ii . 


URliAX    V 

FROM    A    I'OKriCAIl'    IN    THE    HKIIISH    MLSKU.M 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  273 

urge  the  same  duty,  glow  with  the  same  fervour, 
extol  the  same  ideal. 

To  the  Pope,  as  to  the  Emperor,  Petrarch  writes 
with  an  uncompromising  freedom  of  speech  which 
shows  that  his  high-flown  compliments  are  the 
language  of  conventional  courtesy,  not  of  adula- 
tion. A  long  preface  explains  why  the  writer  had 
allowed  more  than  three  years  to  elapse  since 
Urban's  election  before  addressing  him  ;  he  had 
delayed  not  from  distrust  of  his  powers,  for  the 
zeal  of  his  heart  might  well  compensate  for  their 
deficiency,  nor  yet  from  fear  of  the  Pope's  dis- 
pleasure, against  which  his  own  age  and  Urban's 
goodness  gave  him  double  protection  ;  but  partly 
from  unwillingness  to  incur  suspicion  of  flattery  by 
praising  one  so  highly  placed,  and  partly  from  fear 
that  if  he  praised  the  good  work  that  Urban  had 
already  done,  he  might  repeat  with  the  Pope  his 
lamentable  experience  with  the  Emperor ;  the  later 
event  might  belie  the  early  promise,  and  he  might 
have  vehemently  to  blame  one  whom  he  had  pre- 
maturely praised.  For  often  those  who  show  bril- 
liant promise  in  lesser  things  fail  in  the  supreme 
business  of  their  life  ;  and  of  all  life's  businesses 
those  of  Pope  and  Emperor  are  the  supreme  ones. 

Now  he  breaks  silence,  for  three  years  and  more 
have  passed  without  sign  of  the  accomplishment  of 
the  great  work.  All  this  while  he  had  never  lost 
hope,  knowing  and  saying  to  others  more  im- 
patient than  himself  that  great  enterprises  cannot 
be  done  in  a  hurry.  But  now  time  enough  for 
reasonable  preparation  has  gone  by  ;  he  must  ask 

T 


274     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

a  patient  hearing  for  exhortation,  perhaps  even  for 
blame. 

Let  Urban  consider,  while  he  does  lesser  things 
consummately  well  at  Avignon,  in  what  state  lies  his 
natural  home,  his  spiritual  bride.  True,  the  whole 
Church  is  his,  and  the  city  in  which  he  chooses  to 
dwell  may  be  called  his  bride  ;  none  the  less  Rome 
has  a  peculiar  claim  on  him  ;  all  other  cities  have 
their  special  bridegrooms ;  she  alone  has  no  bishop 
but  the  Pope.  He  bids  all  other  bishops  reside 
in  their  sees  ;  how  then  can  he  leave  the  queen 
of  cities  in  ruins,  spoiled  by  robbers,  and  desolate 
of  her  bridegroom  ?  Surely  his  very  name,  volun- 
tarily assumed  and  hailed  as  an  omen  of  hope,  is  a 
call  that  Urban  cannot  ignore.  His  noble  mind 
may  despise  world-given  glory  ;  but  let  him  think 
what  merit  Christ  will  impute  to  him  who  brings  His 
Church  back  to  the  place  where  He  established  her. 
Of  all  six  Popes  who  have  sat  at  Avignon,  Urban 
has  received  the  clearest  call  to  the  great  work ; 
for  in  his  election  the  finger  of  God  was  almost 
miraculously  made  manifest.  If  the  return  to  Rome 
is  God's  will,  He  will  perform  it  through  some  one  ; 
why  should  Urban  leave  to  a  successor  the  glory  of 
being  His  instrument? 

Four  qualities  are  requisite  in  the  man  who  shall 
do  the  great  work  ;  Urban  possesses  them  all.  He 
has  intellectual  ability,  for  lack  of  which  some  have 
been  unable  to  discern  the  good  cause  from  the 
bad.  He  has  goodness  of  heart  and  will ;  many 
have  let  their  passions  overpower  the  conviction  of 
their  minds,     He  has  experience ;    for   lack  of  it 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  275 

many  have  maintained  the  superiority  of  Provence 
over  Italy.  Lastly,  he  is  disinterested;  many  oppose 
the  return  to  Rome  out  of  regard  for  their  worldly 
interests  in  Avignon.  In  a  word,  Pope  Urban  is 
marked  out  as  the  man  to  return  to  the  Urbs. 

Lately  he  had  a  magnificent  reception  at  Mar- 
seilles ;  that  was  but  a  feeble  earnest  of  what  would 
await  him  in  Rome.  And  who  can  say  that  Avig- 
non is  a  safe  residence  and  Rome  a  dangerous  one  ? 
Safe!  Why  the  Great  Company  lately  held  city 
and  Pope  to  ransom  ;  Urban  suffered  worse  indig- 
nities than  Boniface ;  and  if  Rome  is  turbulent,  the 
Pope's  absence  is  the  main  cause  of  her  turbulence. 
Never  can  he  be  as  happy  at  Avignon  as  in  Rome, 
for  only  in  Rome  can  he  feel  that  he  is  taking  his 
proper  place  and  doing  his  duty  to  God  and  man. 

Lastly,  nowhere  west  of  Rome  can  Pope  and 
Emperor  honourably  and  fittingly  meet  the  peril 
from  the  Turks.  How,  if  he  stays  at  Avignon, 
will  he  answer  Christ  and  Peter  in  the  fast-ap- 
proaching day  of  death  and  judgment  ? 

A  summary  can  give  at  best  but  a  poor  reflection 
of  Petrarch's  argument ;  the  actual  letter  occupies 
eighteen  folio  pages,  and  from  every  page  breathes 
the  persuasiveness  of  earnest  conviction.  But  could 
its  author  hope  to  succeed  at  this  third  attempt  ? 
The  obstacles  micrht  well  seem  as  formidable  as 
ever.  Once  again  the  Pope  was  a  Frenchman,  and 
the  French  party  had  a  stronger  hold  than  ever  on 
the  Sacred  College.  Only  the  Pope's  personality 
was  changed,  but  this  was  a  change  indeed.  Bene- 
dict, it  is  true,  was  not  exactly  the  "ass"  that  he 


276     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

styled  himself  in  the  first  surprise  of  his  election, 
but  his  intellect  was  of  the  narrowest  theological 
type,  he  was  dull  of  imagination,  impermeable  by 
ideas.  Clement  had  the  wit  to  understand  and 
the  taste  to  value  a  fine  conception,  but  lacked  the 
driving  power  of  moral  purpose.  Of  Urban,  on  the 
contrary,  Petrarch  could  say  without  flattery  that 
he  seemed  to  combine  in  himself  all  the  requisite 
qualities  :  a  great  policy  was  congenial  to  his  mind, 
unselfish  devotion  to  duty  was  perhaps  the  keynote 
of  his  character,  and  he  had  already  given  proof  of 
no  little  sagacity  in  carrying  out  reforms.  At  last, 
then,  Petrarch  might  hope  for  success,  and  the 
course  of  events  soon  justified  his  hopefulness. 
How  far  his  appeal  actually  influenced  the  Pope 
cannot  be  determined,  but  considering  his  great 
reputation  and  the  high  esteem  in  which  his  letters 
were  held,  it  is  reasonable  to  suppose  that  his 
advocacy  had  weight  with  Urban,  if  not  in  forming 
his  decision,  at  least  in  confirming  it  and  in  hasten- 
ing its  execution.  His  letter  is  dated  June  29th; 
the  year  is  demonstrably  1366  ;  and  before  the  end 
of  that  year  the  Papal  Legate  was  busy  getting  ready 
a  summer  residence  for  the  Pope  at  Viterbo,  restor- 
ing the  ruined  palaces  of  Rome,  and  even  arranging 
with  Venice,  Genoa,  and  Naples  for  a  supply  of 
galleys  to  bring  the  Papal  Court  by  sea  from  the 
Rhone  to  the  Tiber. 

On  April  30th,  1367,  the  Pope  left  Avignon,  on 
June  9th  he  reached  Viterbo,  and  about  the  end 
of  the  month  went  on  to  Rome.  The  Babylonish 
captivity  was  apparently  at  an  end,  and  Petrarch 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  277 

poured  out  his  soul  in  a  long  congratulatory  letter 
to  the  Pope.  But  even  in  this  psean  of  praise  and 
thanksgiving  there  is  a  characteristic  note  of  warn- 
ing and  of  exhortation  to  persevere.  Petrarch  was 
an  enthusiast  with  a  keen  eye  for  actualities ;  he 
knew  that  the  French  party  would  spare  no  effort 
to  bring  about  a  return  to  Avignon,  and  almost  in 
the  same  breath  with  his  exultant  cry  that  Israel 
was  come  out  of  Egypt  and  the  House  of  Jacob 
from  among  a  strange  people,  he  exhorts  the  Pope 
to  endurance  in  well-doing,  to  patience  in  over- 
coming difficulties,  and  to  vigilance  against  the  arts 
of  the  malcontents.  Two  dangers  cause  him  special 
uneasiness.  One  is  the  self-indulgent  epicurism  of 
the  Court.  This  base  motive  he  combats  in  a  vein 
of  scornful  persiflage,  which  overlies  but  does  not 
conceal  his  deep  anxiety.  These  people  judge  a 
country  by  the  quality  not  of  its  sons  but  of  its  tuns; 
they  prefer  the  wine  they  get  in  Provence  to  the 
vintages  of  Italy.  But  was  ever  a  man  so  desperate 
a  drunkard  as  to  want  to  sleep  in  his  vineyard  ? 
Wine  is  grown  in  the  vineyard,  kept  in  the  cellar, 
drunk  in  the  hall ;  the  two  first  are  the  steward's 
business,  only  the  third  is  the  master's.  Wherever 
you  live,  your  wine  must  be  brought  to  the  house, 
and  if  these  people  must  needs  drink  French  wine 
in  Italy,  well,  a  little  extra  toil  of  sailors  who  will 
enjoy  the  job  will  bring  it  them,  and  it  will  have 
improved  on  the  voyage.  And  so  forth.  The 
other  chief  danger  is  the  arcjument  from  Italian 
turbulence.  Already  a  street  riot  at  Viterbo  had 
served  the  French  party  only  too  well  as  an  instance 


278      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

of  mob-violence,  and  Petrarch  foresaw  that  they 
would  magnify  such  petty  incidents,  and  possibly 
even  provoke  them,  in  the  hope  of  frightening 
Urban  back  to  their  own  country. 

It  is  curious  that,  except  for  a  brief  acknowledg- 
ment of  the  importance  of  the  Galilean  Church,  he 
hardly  notices  the  one  serious  argument  by  which  a 
statesman  might  have  defended  a  preference  for 
Avignon.  The  centre  of  European  gravity  had 
shifted  northwards.  France,  Germany,  and,  above 
all,  England  were  daily  growing  more  important ; 
and  it  was  at  least  arguable  that  Southern  France 
could  now  provide  a  more  convenient  ecclesiastical 
capital  than  central  Italy.  Petrarch's  silence  on 
this  point  was  certainly  not  due  to  lack  of  counter- 
arguments ;  it  is  fairly  safe  to  infer  from  it  that 
motives  of  self-interest,  not  those  of  public  policy, 
were  the  really  formidable  influences  at  work. 

Urban  took  all  this  exhortation  in  the  spirit  in 
which  it  was  given,  and  sent  his  monitor  more  than 
one  cordial  invitation  to  pay  him  a  visit.  Nothing 
could  have  been  more  gratifying  to  Petrarch,  but 
for  the  moment  he  seems  to  have  been  unable  to 
accept ;  probably  the  state  of  his  health  made  it 
difficult  for  him  to  undertake  so  long  a  journey. 

During  the  years  1367-8  he  divided  his  time  as 
usual  between  Venice,  Padua,  and  Pavia.  In  the 
latter  year  his  visit  to  Galeazzo  was  paid  earlier  in 
the  season  than  usual ;  the  interminable  quarrel 
between  the  Visconti  and  the  Church  had  entered 
a  new  phase,  and  Galeazzo,  for  the  moment  anxious 
for  peace,  sent  for  Petrarch  to  help  him  in  treating 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  279 

for  it.  Petrarch  accordingly  left  Padua  on  May  25th, 
and  arrived  at  Pavia  on  the  29th.  The  Pope  was 
represented  by  his  brother,  Cardinal  Grimoard, 
whom  he  had  lately  placed  as  Legate  in  Bologna, 
and  Petrarch  was  evidently  welcomed  as  the  friend 
of  both  parties  to  the  dispute.  But  the  negotiations 
came  to  nothing,  and  the  war  went  on.  From 
Pavia,  according  to  the  received  story,  of  which 
however  there  is  no  confirmation  in  Petrarch's  own 
writings,  he  went  on  to  Milan  to  be  present  at  a 
ceremony  of  no  little  interest  to  Englishmen. 
Galeazzo,  eager  for  royal  alliances,  was  not  con- 
tent with  having  married  his  son  to  a  princess  of 
France  ;  he  was  now  about  to  marry  his  daughter 
to  a  prince  of  England.  Lionel  "  of  Antwerp," 
Duke  "of  Clarence,  third  son  of  Edward  III,  had 
been  four  years  a  widower;  and  for  half  that  time 
negotiations  had  been  going  on  for  his  marriage 
with  Galeazzo's  daughter  Violante.  At  last  the 
treaty  had  been  signed  at  Windsor.  The  bride- 
groom contributed  royal  blood,  a  handsome  person, 
and  the  theoretical  ownership,  derived  from  his  first 
wife,  of  large  estates  in  Ireland.  The  bride  brought 
two  hundred  thousand  grolden  florins  and  the  effec- 
tive  lordship  of  several  townships  in  Piedmont. 
After  brilliant  festivities  in  France  and  Savoy,  the 
Duke  of  Clarence  reached  Milan,  and  one  day 
early  in  June — there  is  the  usual  conflict  of  evidence 
as  to  the  exact  date — the  marriag-e  was  solemnised 
with  the  utmost  splendour  in  the  church  of  Santa 
Maria  Maggiore.  The  received  tradition  says  that 
at  the  banquet  which  followed,  Petrarch  sat  at  the 


28o     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

high  table  among  the  most  illustrious  guests.  The 
Duke  lived  but  a  short  time  to  enjoy  his  bride  and 
her  wealth  ;  less  than  five  months  after  his  marriage 
he  died  of  fever  in  Piedmont.  There  was  the 
usual  talk  of  poison,  but  Galeazzo  had  much  to 
lose  and  nothing  to  gain  by  his  son-in-law's  death, 
and  an  Englishman's  imprudence  in  a  strange 
climate  furnishes  a  sufficient  and  probable  ex- 
planation. 

In  July  Petrarch  resolved  to  return  to  Padua. 
But  Lombardy  had  once  again  become  a  vast 
camp,  divided  between  the  rival  armies  of  the 
Visconti  and  the  league  organised  against  them  by 
the  Pope.  Travel  might  well  seem  impossible,  but 
Petrarch  would  not  be  deterred  from  the  attempt. 
He  chartered  a  boat,  coaxed  a  half- frightened 
company  of  boatmen  to  work  her,  took  not  a 
weapon  to  defend  himself  with,  and  sailed  quietly 
down  the  Po.  The  adventure  had  an  astonishing 
success.  Through  the  river-fleets  and  between  the 
massed  squadrons  of  both  armies  sailed  this  invalid 
old  man  of  a  perfect  courage,  and  the  officers  of 
both  hosts  vied  with  each  other  in  doing  him 
honour.  His  voyage  was  a  triumphal  progress, 
delayed  not  by  the  hostility  but  by  the  assiduous 
kindness  of  all  whom  he  met.  Hardly  ever  in  the 
world's  history  has  the  soldier  rendered  such  homage 
to  the  poet. 

Even  this  peaceful  triumph  scarcely  gave 
adequate  compensation  for  the  loss  of  a  visit  from 
Boccaccio.  The  latter  had  left  Florence  towards 
the  end  of  March,  meaning  to  go  straight  through 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  281 

to  Venice  and  enjoy  with  Petrarch  the  mutual 
delight  of  a  surprise  visit.  Bad  weather  and  perils 
by  the  wayside  delayed  his  journey,  and  he  was  still 
detained  at  Bologna  when  he  heard  that  Petrarch 
had  left  Venice  on  his  unseasonable  journey  to 
Pavia.  How  keen  was  the  disappointment  may  be 
read  in  Boccaccio's  charming-  letter  of  regret.  "  I 
almost  gave  up  the  project,"  he  writes;  "indeed 
there  was  excellent  reason  for  stopping  short.  For 
however  many  things  worth  seeing  there  may  be  in 
Venice,  none  of  all  these  would  have  induced  me  to 
start ;  and  it  was  only  the  wish  to  keep  faith  with 
certain  friends,  and  to  see  those  two  whom  you  love 
best,  your  Tullia  and  her  Francesco  (whom  till  then 
I  had  not  known,  though  I  think  I  know  all  your 
other  intimates),  that  persuaded  me  to  resume 
the  journey  and  accomplish  it  at  the  cost  of  im- 
mense fatigue."  And,  after  warmest  praises  of 
F'^rancesca  and  her  husband,  he  delightfully  adds  : 
"  But  what  that  belongs  to  you,  or  is  of  your  making, 
can  I  refrain  from  praising  ? " 

Sorrow  once  more  dealt  heavily  with  Petrarch  in 
this  year,  which  took  from  him  both  the  youngest 
and  the  oldest  of  those  whom  he  loved,  his  baby 
grandson  and  Guido  Settimo,  Archbishop  of  Genoa. 
Guido  had  been  his  playmate  in  childhood,  his 
constant  companion  in  youth,  his  welcome  guest  at 
Vaucluse,  where  he  found  occasional  relaxation  from 
the  strain  of  a  busy  life,  his  friend  always. 

The  end  of  the  year  was  marked  by  a  happier 
event.  Philip  de  Cabassoles,  who  for  the  last  seven 
years  had  borne  the   honorific  but  empty  title  of 


282      PETRARCH   AND    HIS   TIMES 

Patriarch  of  Jerusalem,  was  raised  to  the  Cardinal- 
ate,  and  to  this  dignity  was  added  in  the  following 
year  the  Bishopric  of  Sabina.  The  immediate 
cause  of  Philip's  elevation  was  his  conduct  of  a 
special  mission  to  administer  the  ecclesiastical  affairs 
of  Marseilles  ;  but  apart  from  his  success  in  this 
particular  work,  his  appointment  was  an  instance 
of  Urban's  determination  to  regard  character  and 
ability  as  the  qualifications  for  high  office  in  the 
Church. 

The  year  1369  is  notable  in  Petrarch's  life,  chiefly 
as  the  date  of  his  first  stay  at  Arqu^,  a  village 
in  the  Euganean  hills,  which  thereafter  became  his 
regular  summer  residence,  and  will  be  more  fully 
described  in  the  next  chapter.  In  the  same  year  he 
availed  himself  of  his  favour  with  the  Pope  to 
espouse  the  cause  of  Thomas  of  Frignano,  General 
of  the  Franciscans.  The  Chapter  of  the  Order 
had  elected  Thomas  against  the  wish  of  their 
patron,  the  Cardinal  of  Limoges  ;  other  members  of 
the  Order  shared  the  Cardinal's  dislike  of  the  new 
General,  and  accused  him  of  heresy.  The  scandal 
was  so  grave  that  Urban  suspended  Thomas  from 
his  functions,  and  summoned  him  to  defend  himself 
in  Rome.  Petrarch,  who  was  convinced  of  the 
General's  innocence  and  held  his  character  in  high 
esteem,  wrote  an  eloquent  defence  of  him  to  the 
Pope,  which  may  well  have  influenced  Urban  in 
forming  his  decision.  This  was,  at  all  events,  in 
Thomas's  favour ;  he  was  completely  acquitted  and 
reinstated  in  his  office,  and  his  subsequent  career 
amply  justified  Petrarch's  opinion  of  him.      He  was 


THE    POPE    IN    ROME  283 

made    Patriarch    of    Grado    by    Gregory    XI,    and 
Cardinal  by  Urban  VI. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  year  came  another  press- 
ing invitation  from  Urban  to  visit  Rome.  In  reply 
Petrarch  wrote,  on  Christmas  Eve,  deploring  his 
inability  to  travel  at  that  season,  but  promising 
to  obey  the  Pope's  summons  without  fail  in  the  fol- 
lowing spring.  In  April,  accordingly,  he  made  his 
will  and  set  out  from  Padua ;  but  on  reaching 
Ferrara,  barely  fifty  miles  away,  he  was  seized  with 
a  fainting  fit  which  was  reported  to  be  fatal,  and 
very  nearly  proved  so.  After  all,  it  was  perhaps  as 
well  that  he  was  stopped  on  the  journey  :  his  dis- 
appointment, had  he  arrived  in  Rome,  might  have 
been  even  keener  than  his  disappointment  at  being 
baulked  of  his  visit.  He  would  have  found  the 
Pope  distraught  with  manifold  anxieties,  hampered 
by  the  incessant  intrigues  of  his  courtiers,  doubting 
if  he  had  done  right  in  coming  to  Rome,  and  more 
than  half  inclined  to  go  back  to  Avignon.  Highly 
as  he  esteemed  Petrarch's  zeal  for  great  principles, 
and  much  as  he  admired  his  eloquence  in  defending 
them,  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  poet's  exhor- 
tations could  have  outweighed  the  pressure  of  un- 
toward circumstances.  Since  Urban  had  been  in 
Rome,  troubles  had  multiplied  round  him.  True, 
he  had  escaped  the  humiliating  state  of  dependence 
which  had  threatened  to  make  the  Papacy  a  depart- 
ment of  the  Government  of  France.  The  verdict 
of  history  holds,  with  Petrarch  and  with  Saint 
Catherine,  that  this  grreat  deliverance  was  worth  all 
the  sacrifices  necessary  to  achieve  it.      But  Urban 


284     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

might  be  pardoned  if  he  thought  that  it  been  bought 
too  dear.  Vexation  and  disappointment  had  been 
his  portion  in  Rome.  The  Emperor  had  visited 
him  in  1368;  but  the  courtesies  in  which  Charles 
abounded  were  poor  compensation  for  the  deadly- 
mischief  that  he  caused  to  the  peace  of  Tuscany. 
Lombardy  was  ablaze  with  war.  The  Pope's 
enemies  defied  him,  his  friends  fought  more  for 
their  own  hands  than  for  Holy  Church.  All  the 
time  the  pressure  of  the  French  party  never 
slackened.  Five  of  the  Cardinals  had  flatly  re- 
fused to  leave  Avignon  ;  their  compatriots,  wiser  in 
their  generation,  accompanied  Urban  to  Italy  and 
gave  him  no  peace  while  he  stayed  there.  The 
Pope  was  a  disillusioned  man,  and  in  the  bitterness 
of  disillusionment  he  yielded.  He  took  the  Curia 
back  to  Avignon  in  September,  and  died  there 
in  December. 

Petrarch's  last  political  hope  was  shattered: 
Tribunate,  Empire,  Papacy,  each  had  failed ;  Rome 
was  once  more  a  "widow."  But  his  disappoint- 
ment, bitter  as  it  was,  did  not  poison  his  mind 
against  Urban  ;  he  heard  of  his  death  with  sincere 
sorrow,  and  in  spite  of  ill-health,  which  might  well 
have  been  accounted  a  valid  excuse,  he  testified  his 
veneration  for  the  Pope's  saintly  character  by  at- 
tending his  funeral  at  Bologna. 


CHAPTER   XVIII 

THE   LAST   YEARS 
1370-1374 

THE  record  of  an  invalid's  last  years  must  have 
a  certain  sadness,  but  it  would  be  a  great 
mistake  to  represent  the  end  of  Petrarch's  life  as  a 
period  of  gloom.  On  the  contrary,  we  have  to 
chronicle  a  triumph  of  character  over  circumstance. 
Events  were  untoward  ;  but  events,  after  all,  are 
only  the  raw  material  of  life  ;  it  is  a  man's  way  of 
dealing  with  them  that  makes  or  mars  the  finished 
article.  Petrarch  comes  out  of  this  test  with  a  new 
hold  on  our  sympathies,  a  new  claim  to  our  admira- 
tion. Continual  ill-health,  the  pain  of  a  patriot's 
disappointment,  disturbance  of  his  chosen  home  by 
turmoil  of  war,  the  defeat  and  humiliation  of  a 
dear  friend,  here  surely  were  troubles  enough  to 
breed  despondency,  almost  to  excuse  moroseness. 
Petrarch  met  them  all  with  a  serenity  that  illumines 
the  dark  places  and  sheds  a  halo  over  the  whole 
retrospect  of  his  life.  He  had  a  scholar's  tenacity, 
a  scholar's  courage,  a  scholar's  inexhaustible  con- 
solations. 

Once,  indeed,  in  the  midst  of  all  this  calm  con- 
fronting of  adversity,  the  old  Adam  flashed  out  into 
vehemence  of  invective.     But  this  time  it  was  no 

285 


286      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

mere  private  quarrel  that  stirred  his  wrath ;  Rome 
was  attacked  in  the  person  of  her  champion,  and  it 
was  in  defence  of  Rome,  far  more  than  of  himself, 
that  he  once  more  steeped  his  pen  in  gall.  A 
French  Cistercian,  angered  by  his  letters  of  ex- 
hortation and  congratulation  to  Pope  Urban,  had 
published  a  clumsy  and  silly  pamphlet  by  way  of 
counterblast.  The  quality  of  its  wit  may  be  judged 
from  the  opening  sentences,  which  compare  Pope 
Urban's  journey  from  Avignon  to  Rome  with  that 
of  the  man  who  went  down  from  Jerusalem  to 
Jericho  and  fell  among  thieves.  A  little  later  Rome 
is  elegantly  likened  to  the  waning  moon.  There  is 
much  ill-natured  vilification  of  Petrarch  and  of 
Italy,  and  much  laudation  of  the  superior  excellences 
of  France  and  Frenchmen.  Petrarch  could  not 
leave  this  poor  stuff  alone.  We  have  already  had 
occasion  to  note  that  he  did  not  shine  in  con- 
troversy ;  the  Apology  in  Ansiver  to  a  Frenchvian  s 
Calumnies  bears  a  depressing  likeness  to  the  rubbish 
which  it  undertakes  to  confute.  It  is  not  such 
sheer  nonsense  ;  it  is  written  in  decent  Latin,  and 
it  has  the  merit  of  patriotic  motive  ;  but  it  is  marred 
by  a  note  of  rancour,  and  those  who  love  its  author 
do  not  willingly  read  it  twice. 

Urban's  successor  was  Pierre  Roger  de  Beaufort, 
nephew  and  namesake  of  Clement  VI,  who  is 
famous  in  history  under  his  papal  name  of 
Gregory  XI,  as  the  friend  of  St.  Catherine  of 
Siena,  and  the  Pope  who  finally  brought  back  the 
Curia  to  Rome.  He  was  a  man  of  great  ability 
and  high  character,  sincere  in  his  efforts  to  reform 


THE    LAST   YEARS  287 

the  monastic  orders,  and  equally  sincere  in  combat- 
ing the  doctrines  of  Wickliffe.  Towards  Petrarch 
he  showed  the  kindliest  goodwill,  and  soon  after 
his  accession  instructed  Bruno  to  write  him  a  letter 
expressing  friendship,  and  hinting  an  intention  of 
doing  something  for  him.  Petrarch's  reply  is  in- 
terestinor  as  showingr  that  his  considerable  income 
was  barely  sufficient  to  meet  the  many  claims  upon 
it.  He  cannot  say  with  truth,  he  tells  Bruno,  that 
his  means  are  insufficient  for  the  maintenance  of  a 
simple  canon,  but  he  can  say  quite  truly  that  he 
has  a  wider  circle  of  acquaintance  than  all  the  rest 
of  the  Chapter  put  together,  and  these  friends  put 
him  to  charges.  Besides  an  old  priest  who  lives 
with  him,  a  whole  troop  will  often  turn  up  at  meal- 
times ;  they  swarm  like  Penelope's  suitors,  only 
they  are  friends,  not  enemies,  and  he  has  not  the 
heart  to  turn  them  away  or  grudge  them  the 
victuals.  Then,  alas !  he  cannot  do  without 
servants  ;  and  he  keeps  a  couple  of  horses, 
and  usually  five  or  six  scribes.  Just  now  he 
has  only  three,  because  scribes  worthy  of  the 
name  are  not  to  be  found  :  one  only  gets  mere 
mechanical  copyists — and  bad  ones  at  that.  Then 
he  is  undertaking  to  build  a  little  oratory  to  the 
Virgin.  This  work  he  will  accomplish  if  he  has  to 
pawn  or  sell  his  books  to  pay  for  it.  So  if  Gregory 
is  minded  to  do  for  him  what  Urban  had  promised, 
and  he  himself  hints,  the  gift  will  be  welcome. 
Petrarch  can,  indeed,  manage  at  a  pinch  as  he  has 
managed  hitherto,  but  age  makes  the  pinch  harder. 
Only  do  not  let  the  Pope  expect  him  to  ask   for 


288      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

anything.      Let  him  do  anything  or  nothing,  just  as 
he  sees  fit ;  in  any  case,  though,  let  him  not  confer 
a  cure  of  souls  or  any  office  entailing  fresh  labour. 
Petrarch  had  refused  secretaryships  and  bishoprics 
from    Clement.     He   cannot,  as  an  old  man,  take 
from  the  nephew  burdens  which,  as  a  young  man,  he 
had  refused  to  receive  from  the  uncle.     Finally,  he 
commends  the  whole  matter  to  the  goodness  of  the 
Pope  and  the  kind  offices  of  Bruno  and  Philip  de 
Cabassoles.     It  does  not  appear  that  any  additional 
benefice  was  conferred,  or  that  Petrarch  was  very 
seriously  straitened  for  want  of  one;  in  his  personal 
habits  he  was  the  most  frugal  of  men,   and  any 
accession    of    income    would   probably   have    been 
spent  on  the  further  multiplication  of  manuscripts. 
The  letter,  of  which  the  above  is  a  brief  summary, 
was  written  at  Whitsuntide,  1371,  from  Arqua,  where 
Petrarch  had  now  established  his  summer  residence. 
His  first  recorded  stay  in  the  place  was,  as  we  have 
already  seen,  in  the  summer  of  1369,  when  he  took 
refuge  from  the  turmoil  of  the  city  in  the  hospitable 
house  of  the  Aus^ustinian  Friars  there.     He  was  so 
charmed  with  the  beauty  of  the  place,  that  he  got 
Lombardo  da  Serico  to  negotiate  for  the  purchase 
of  a  plot  of  ground,  comprising  a  vineyard  and  an 
orchard  of  olives  and  other  fruit  trees.     Here  he 
built  a  house,  which   still  stands   structurally  un- 
altered, and  bears  witness  to  the  simplicity  of  his 
domestic   habits  and  his  appreciation  of   beautiful 
scenery.     Englishmen    need    no   assurance  of   the 
loveliness  of  the  hills  which  inspired  the  Muse  of 
Shelley.     Arqua    lies    in    a    long    narrow    valley 


THE    LAST    YEARS  289 

hemmed  in  by  conical  peaks  and  their  connectincr 
ridges  ;  in  the  whole  neighbourhood  there  is  not  a 
spot  which  looks  out  on  a  more  enchanting  land- 
scape than  the  site  chosen  by  Petrarch  for  his 
house.  He  built  it  on  a  little  spur  jutting  out  from 
a  hill-side,  which  shelters  it  from  the  north-east ;  to 
the  west  and  south  are  glorious  views  up  and  across 
the  valley;  to  the  south-east  the  village  scrambles, 
Italian  fashion,  up  the  lower  slopes  :  in  Petrarch's 
day  it  was  crowned  by  a  castle,  of  which  only  some 
ruined  arches  and  a  fine  thirteenth-century  tower 
now  remain.  Beyond  the  village  is  the  only  ap- 
parent outlet  from  the  valley,  a  narrow  gap  in  the 
hills  leading  to  the  flat  water-meadows  and  isolated 
crag  of  Monselice, 

All  through  this  period,  Petrarch's  life  hung  by  a 
thread.  Four  times  in  one  year,  he  tells  Pandolfo 
Malatesta,  he  was  threatened  with  imminent  death  ; 
the  first  of  these  occasions  must  have  been  the 
fainting-fit  of  Ferrara  already  mentioned,  the  last, 
as  we  learn  from  his  own  letter,  occurred  in  the 
spring  of  1371.  He  had  lately  come  back  from 
Arqua  to  spend  a  few  days  in  Padua,  and  was  just 
going  to  answer  Pandolfo's  anxious  inquiries  about 
his  health  by  telling  him  that  he  was  getting  the 
better  of  a  long  sickness.  "But  all  of  a  sudden,"  he 
writes,  "on  May  8th,  a  most  violent  fit  of  my  familiar 
fever  seized  me.  The  physicians  flocked  in,  some 
sent  by  order  of  the  lord  of  the  city,  others  drawn 
to  the  house  by  friendly  concern  for  me.  Up  and 
down  they  wrangled  and  disputed,  till  at  last  they 
settled  that  I  was  to  die  at  midnight :  already  it  was 
u 


290      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

the  first  watch  of  the  night ;  see  what  a  tiny  span 
of  life  remained  to  me,  if  these  humbugging-  fellows' 
tales  had  been  true.      But  every  day  confirms  me 
more  and  more  in  my  old  opinion  of  them.     They 
said  there  was  one  possible  expedient  for  prolonging 
my  life  a  little,  by  tying  me  up  in  some  arrangement 
of  strings  and  so  preventing  me  from  going  to  sleep: 
in  this  way  there  was  just  a  chance  that   I   might 
last  till  morning — a  mighty  tiresome  price  to  pay  for 
this  little  extra  time !     As  a  matter  of  fact,  to  rob 
me  of  my  sleep  was  just  the  way  to  kill  me.     Well, 
we  disobeyed  them,  for  I  have  always  begged  my 
friends  and  ordered  my  servants  never  to  let  any  of 
these  doctors'  tricks  be  tried  on  my  body,  but  always 
to  do  the  exact  contrary  of  what  they  advise.      So 
I  passed  that  night  in  a  sweet,  deep  sleep,  such  as 
Virgil  calls  the  very  image  of  calm  death.     Why 
make  a  long  story  ?     I  was  to  die  at  midnight.      In 
the   morning,    flocking,    I    suppose,   to  my  funeral, 
they  found  me  writing,  and,  utterly  astounded,  they 
could  say  nothing  but  that  I  was  a  wonderful  man. 
Over  and  over  again  they  have  been  baffled  and 
tricked  about  me,  and  yet  they  never  stop  impu- 
dently asserting  what  they  know  nothing  about,  nor 
can  they  find  any  other  shield  than  this  to  cover 
their  ignorance.    Yet  if  I  am  a  wonderful  man,  how 
much  more  wonderful  are  they !     And  as  for  those 
who  believe  in  them,  they  are  not  merely  wonderful, 
but  astounding." 

It  must  be  owned  that  Petrarch's  experience  lent 
some  colour  to  his  quarrel  with  the  doctors.  But  in 
truth  his  condition  was  beyond  hope  of  relief  from 


THE    LAST    YEARS  291 

the  science  of  that  day.  A  year  later  he  had  another 
painful  reminder  of  his  physical  weakness.  Philip 
de  Cabassoles  had  come  as  Legate  into  Umbria, 
and  with  affectionate  urgency  insisted  that  Petrarch 
must  come  to  visit  him  in  Perugia.  No  possible 
summons  could  have  been  more  agreeable  to  the 
latter,  and  in  May,  1372,  he  tried  to  obey  it,  but 
found  himself  unable  to  sit  on  horseback.  The 
friends  never  saw  each  other  again,  for  Philip  died 
in  the  following  August. 

Meanwhile,  war  had  broken  out  between  Padua 
and  Venice,  and  Petrarch  could  no  longer  enjoy  the 
use  of  his  house  in  the  latter  city.  "  I  should  be 
suspected  there,"  he  writes,  in  January,  1372  ;  "  here 
(at  Padua)  I  am  beloved."  During  the  spring  and 
summer  he  seems  to  have  been  much  at  Arqua,  but 
in  the  autumn  the  progress  of  the  war  drove  him 
thence.  Things  had  gone  badly  for  the  Paduans, 
and  the  Venetian  general  camped  his  army  within  a 
short  distance  of  Arqua.  Residence  in  the  country 
was  no  longer  safe,  and,  sorely  against  the  grain, 
Petrarch  transferred  himself  and  his  family  about 
the  middle  of  November  within  the  walls  of  Padua. 

The  Venetians  pursued  their  success  in  the  follow- 
ing year,  and  Francesco  da  Carrara,  after  vainly 
soliciting  help  from  the  King  of  Hungary,  found 
himself  obliged  to  sue  for  peace  and  accept  what 
terms  the  republic  would  grant  him.  Venice  was 
never  slow  to  set  her  foot  on  the  neck  of  an  enemy. 
She  stipulated  that  the  Lord  of  Padua  should 
acknowledge  himself  to  be  entirely  in  the  wrong, 
and  that  either  in  his  own  person,  or  in  that  of  his 


292      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

son,  he  should  go  to  Venice  to  entreat  pardon  for 
the  past,  and  swear  allegiance  for  the  future.  Fran- 
cesco despatched  his  son  on  this  painful  errand,  and 
begged  Petrarch  to  accompany  him  as  chief  spokes- 
man. The  Venetian  Senate  gave  them  audience  on 
September  28th,  but  Petrarch,  seized  probably  with 
illness,  found  himself  unable  to  deliver  the  speech 
which  he  had  prepared  ;  the  audience  was  postponed 
till  the  following  day,  when  the  speech  was  duly 
delivered,  and  the  humiliating  ceremony  accom- 
plished. 

There  were  probably  not  many  men  still  living 
for  whom  Petrarch  would  have  undertaken  such  a 
task,  but  he  was  bound  to  Francesco  by  ties  of  close 
and  peculiar  affection.  That  prince  had  inherited 
the  leading  characteristics  of  his  father  Jacopo,  his 
unscrupulousness  in  politics,  his  cultured  intellect, 
and  his  personal  charm  ;  he  inherited  also  his  warm 
and  sincere  regard  for  Petrarch.  Francesco  could 
not  have  treated  his  own  father  with  more  solicitous 
respect  than  he  paid  to  his  father's  friend.  Nothing 
that  could  make  Petrarch's  stay  in  Padua  agreeable 
was  omitted,  and  when  he  fled  from  the  bustle  of  the 
city  to  the  quietude  of  Arqua,  Francesco  delighted 
to  visit  him  there  and  engage  him  in  discussions  on 
the  subjects  that  interested  them  both.  It  was  to 
him  that,  just  about  this  time,  Petrarch  wrote  the 
long  letter  on  the  principles  of  government,  which, 
in  the  Bale  edition  of  his  works,  is  printed  as  a 
separate  treatise  under  the  title  On  the  best  methods 
of  ad^ninistering  a  State.  The  pamphlet  is  especi- 
ally notable  for  the  stress  that  it  lays  on  the  ethical 


THE    LAST   YEARS  293 

basis  of  government,  and  on  the  moral  qualities 
requisite  to  make  a  good  ruler.  Here  we  have  a 
marked  contrast  between  Petrarch  and  the  great 
political  thinker  of  the  following  century.  Macchia- 
velli  takes  it  for  granted  that  adminstration  is  a 
prince's  business,  and  proceeds  to  show  how  he  can 
get  through  It  most  efficiently.  Petrarch  "is  con- 
tent to  fill  a  single  letter  with  a  subject  which  might 
well  form  the  matter  of  many  books,  the  question 
what  sort  of  man  he  ouo-ht  to  be  to  whom  the 
charoe  of  the  State  has  been  committed."  The 
ruler,  in  a  word,  must  justify  his  existence  by  ruling 
well. 

It  is  to  this  period,  too,  that  we  must  refer  the 
writing  of  his  autobiography,  which  took  the  form 
of  a  Letter  to  Posterity.  The  desire  to  live  in  the 
thoughts  of  mankind  is  not  peculiar  to  any  age,  but 
it  was  felt  perhaps  with  unwonted  intensity  by  the 
men  of  the  Renaissance.  The  world  was  in  reaction 
against  what  is  commonly  called  the  mediaeval  spirit. 
The  monastic  system  embodied,  as  it  were,  the 
principle  of  self-effacement ;  and  theology,  which 
was  the  chief  intellectual  business  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  contemplates  themes  in  face  of  which  a  mere 
man  shrinks  to  nothingness.  Against  this  withering 
of  the  individual,  the  new  learning  raised  its  protest, 
and  it  is  characteristic  of  Petrarch  that  he  could 
be  at  once  the  fervent  devotee  and  the  scholar 
athirst  for  fame.  It  was  not  enough  for  him  that 
his  influence  should  work  as  a  silent  leaven  in  the 
minds  of  men  ;  he  wanted  to  be  remembered  as  a 
man,  as  a  personality.      "  You  may   perhaps  have 


294     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

heard  some  report  of  me,"  he  writes  to  the  imagin- 
ary recipient  of  the  Letter  to  Posterity,  "and  you 
may  like  to  know  what  sort  of  a  man  I  was,  and 
what  was  the  outcome  of  my  works."  The  letter  is 
only  a  fragment,  and  carries  us  no  further  down  than 
Jacopo  da  Carrara's  death,  when  Petrarch  was  still 
under  fifty.  Nor  does  it  help  us  as  much  as  we 
might  have  expected  in  solving  the  chronological 
difficulties  which  beset  the  student  of  its  author's 
career.  But  the  really  significant  thing  about  it  is 
that  the  idea  of  writing  it  should  have  entered  his 
head. 

The  letters  of  this  period  are  rich  in  instances  of 
the  serene  calm  with  which  Petrarch  awaited  death. 
"  I  read,  I  write,  I  think,"  he  says  of  himself  at 
the  beginning  of  1372  ;  "this  is  my  life,  this  is  my 
delight,  just  as  it  has  been  ever  since  the  days  of 
my  youth.  I  envy  no  man,  I  hate  no  man,  and 
whereas  I  wrote  lono;  agro  that  I  looked  down  on 
no  man,  now  I  must  say  that  I  look  down  on  many, 
but  most  of  all  on  myself."  A  little  more  or  a  little 
less  of  life  does  not  seem  to  him  a  thinof  to  make 
a  fuss  about ;  he  waits  God's  will,  and  in  the  mean- 
time keeps  flying  the  flag  of  his  allegiance  to  Learn- 
ing. In  a  letter  to  Benvenuto  da  Imola,  he  lauds 
poetry  as  the  most  glorious  of  the  arts,  and  in  a 
most  noble  letter  to  Boccaccio,  written  in  1373,  a 
letter  which  they  who  value  learning  should  cherish 
as  a  priceless  heritage,  he  declares  that  nothing  but 
death  shall  tear  him  from  his  beloved  studies. 

Boccaccio  had  written  in  serious  anxiety  about 
his  beloved  master's  health,  and  had  advised  that. 


THE    LAST   YEARS  295 

having  done  more  than  enough  for  reputation,  he 
should  now  allow  himself  a   rest  from   hard   work. 
"  No    counsel    could    be    more    repugnant    to    my 
mood,"  says  Petrarch  with  the  frank  expression  of 
contrary  opinion  possible  between  such  friends.  .   .  . 
"  You   write   that    my  ill-health   makes    you    ill    at 
ease ;   I    know    that,  and    am    not    surprised   at    it. 
Neither  of  us  can  be  really  well  while   the  other 
is  ailing.     You   add   that  you   suppose   the  Comic 
poet's  saying   is   becoming  applicable   to   me,  that 
old  asfe  is  a  disease  in  itself      Here  aoain  is  no- 
thing  to  wonder  at,  nor  do  I  reject  this  utterance  ; 
only  I  should  modify  it  by  saying  that  old  age  is  not 
a  state  of  bodily  disease  but  of  mental  health.    Well, 
would  you   have   me   prefer  that   these    conditions 
should  be  reversed,  so  that   I  should  carry  a  sick 
mind  in  a  sound  body  ?     Far  be  such  a  wish  from 
my  mind !     My  desire  and  my  delight  is  that,  as 
in  the  body,  so  in  the  whole  man,  that  part  which 
is  the    nobler  should    be   healthy  above   the   rest. 
You  instance  me  my  years,  and  this  you  could  not 
have  done  if  I  myself  had  not  told  you  the  tale  of 
them    .    .    .    but  believe  me,  I  remember  them,  and 
every  day  I  say  to  myself,  *  Here  is  one  more  step 
towards  the  end.'    ...    I  remember  them,  and  do 
not  blush  to  acknowledge  my  age  ;   why  should  I 
be   more   ashamed   of   having  grown   old   than   of 
having  lived,  when  the  one  process  cannot  go  on 
long  without  the  other  ?     What  I  should  really  like 
is  not  to  be  younger  than  I  am,  but  to  feel  that  I 
had  reached  old  age  by  a  course  of  more  honour- 
able deeds  and  pursuits  ;  and  nothing  distresses  me 


296      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

more  than  that  in  all  this  long  while  I  have  not 
reached  the  ^oal  that  I  ousfht  to  have  reached. 
Therefore  I  am  still  striving,  if  haply  now  at  even- 
tide it  may  be  granted  me  to  retrieve  the  daytime's 
sloth,  and  often  do  I  call  to  mind  the  maxim  of 
that  most  wise  Prince,  Augustus  Csesar,  that '  what- 
ever is  done  well  enough  is  done  soon  enough  ; '  as 
also  the  saying  of  Plato,  the  most  learned  of  the 
philosophers,  that  *  Happy  is  he  to  whom  it  is 
granted  even  in  old  age  to  attain  to  wisdom  and 
right  opinion  ; '  or  again,  that  Catholic  doctrine  of 
the  most  holy  Father  Ambrose,  that  '  Blessed  is 
the  man  who  even  in  old  aoe  has  risen  from  error ; 
yea,  blessed  is  he  who  even  under  the  very  stroke 
of  death  turns  away  his  mind  from  unrighteous- 
ness.' With  these  and  similar  thoughts  I  am 
brought  to  the  resolution  of  amending  by  God's 
favour  not  only  the  defects  of  my  life,  but  those 
of  my  writings  too;  for  neglect  of  these  faults  might 
in  old  days  have  been  attributed  to  set  purpose, 
but  can  now  be  ascribed  only  to  an  old  man's  torpor 
and  slothfulness. 

"  And  here  comes  in  that  advice  of  yours  which, 
as  I  have  said  and  say  again,  causes  me  utter 
astonishment  ;  for  who  can  fail  to  be  astonished  at 
hearing  counsels  of  sleep  and  laziness  from  the 
mouth  of  the  wakefullest  of  men  ?  Read  again,  I 
pray  you,  and  examine  what  you  wrote ;  sit  in 
judgment  on  your  own  advice,  and  acquit  it  if  you 
dare  ;  the  passage,  I  mean,  where  by  way  of  a 
medicine  for  old  age  you  exhort  me  to  sloth,  a  far 
worse  evil  than  ever  age  can  be ;  and  the  more 


THE    LAST   YEARS  297 

readily  to  persuade  me,  you  try  to  make  me  out  a 
great  man  in  one  respect  or  another,  as  though  I 
might  now  come  to  a  stand  on  the  plea  that  I  have 
gone  far  enough  in  life  and  achievement  and  learn- 
ing. But  I  am  of  quite  another  mind,  as  the  saying 
is,  and  have  come  to  a  very  different  resolution, 
namely,  to  double  my  pace,  and  now  at  this  season 
of  sunset,  as  having  lost  part  of  the  daylight,  to 
make  more  haste  than  ever  towards  the  goal. 

"Now  why  do  you  give  your  friend  advice  which 
you  do  not  take  yourself?  Such  is  not  the  wont  of 
trusty  counsellors.  But  herein  you  have  recourse 
to  a  wonderful  piece  of  wit  and  craft ;  you  say  that 
by  my  writings  I  have  won  reputation  far  and  wide 
.  .  .  that  I  am  known  to  the  uttermost  ends  of 
the  earth.  ...  In  this  your  love  for  me  deceives 
you  ;  it  is  a  really  absurd  exaggeration.  .  .  .  But 
granted  that  it  were  true ;  imagine  my  reputation 
spread  as  widely  as  you  please  ...  do  you  think 
this  would  be  a  rein  to  my  diligence  ?  Nay,  it 
would  be  a  spur  to  it ;  the  more  flourishing  ap- 
peared the  results  of  my  labours,  the  keener  would 
be  my  exertions  in  them ;  such  is  my  mood,  that 
success  would  make  me  not  slothful  but  eager  and 
ardent.  Further,  as  though  the  bounds  of  earth 
were  too  narrow,  you  say  that  I  am  known  also 
above  the  firmament,  a  form  of  praise  bestowed 
on  Aeneas  and  Julius  ;  and  there,  without  any 
doubt,  I  really  am  known  ;  and  I  pray  that  I  may 
be  beloved  there  too.  Next  you  say  in  praise  of 
me  that,  throughout  Italy,  and  very  likely  beyond 
Italy;  too,  I  have  stirred  up  the  wits  of  many  to 


298     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

engage    in    these    studies    of    ours,     which    were 
neglected  for  so  many  centuries  ;  and  this  credit  I 
do  not  disclaim,  for  I  am  older  than  nearly  all  those 
who  are    now    working   at    these    subjects    in   our 
country.      But  your  inference  I  do  not  admit,  that  I 
should  make  way  for  the  talents  of  younger  men, 
break    the    swing   of  the    effort    in    which    I    have 
engaged,  allow  others  to  have  something  to  write 
about  if  they  wish,  and  not  seem  to  want  to  do  all 
the  writing  myself.     Oh,  what  a  difference  of  view 
between  us,  who  have  but  one  will !     To  you  my 
writings  seem  exhaustive,  or  at  any  rate  immense  ; 
to  me  they  seem  a  mere  nothing.     But  granted  I 
have  written  a  great  deal,  and  shall  write  a  great 
deal  more  ;  what  better  means  can  I  possibly  find 
of  inciting  the  minds  of  those  who  come  after  us  to 
perseverance  ?    Example  is  always  more  stimulating 
than  precept ;  Camillus,  a  much  applauded  general 
in  his  old  age,  did  much  more  to  kindle  the  young 
men's    valour  by   marching   to    battle    like  one  of 
themselves,  than  if  he  had  left  them  in  the  fighting 
line,    issued  his  orders,   and  gone  to  bed.     As  for 
your  fear  of  my  exhausting  all  the  subjects,  so  that 
nothing  will   be    left    for   any   one   else,   it   is   like 
Alexander  of  Macedon's  absurd  apprehension  that 
his    father    Philip    would    conquer    the    world   and 
leave  him  no  chance  of  winning  a  soldier's  reputa- 
tion.   .    .   .    But  Seneca  has  rid  us  of  that  fear  in  a 
letter  to  Lucilius.    .    .    . 

"  Our  ancestors  worked  hard  in  old  age  ;  .  .  . 
they  had  no  longer  span  of  life  than  ours,  but  they 
had  greater  industry  ;  and  life  without  industry  is 


THE    LAST    YEARS  299 

not  really  life,  but  a  sluggish  and  unprofitable 
loitering.  .  .  .  Now  your  crowning-  resource  in 
persuasion  is  an  entreaty  that  I  will  try  to  live  as 
long  as  I  can  for  the  joy  of  my  friends,  and  above  all 
for  the  comfort  of  your  own  old  age  ;  for,  as  you  say, 
you  hope  that  I  shall  outlive  you.  Ah  me  !  this  was 
what  our  dear  Simonides  always  hoped  ;  and  again 
ah  me !  his  prayer  was  only  too  fatally  efficacious, 
whereas  if  there  were  any  regularity  in  human 
affairs,  he  ought  to  have  outlived  me.  And  now 
you,  my  brother,  utter  this  affectionate  wish  more 
fervently  than  any  one,  and  some  others  among  my 
friends  utter  it  too  ;  but  it  is  the  exact  opposite  of 
my  wish,  for  I  desire  to  die  while  you  are  still  alive, 
and  so  to  leave  behind  me  some  in  whose  memory 
and  speech  I  may  live  on,  and  by  whose  prayers  I 
may  be  profited,  by  whom  I  may  still  be  loved  and 
missed.    .    .    . 

"  Lastly,  you  ask  me  to  pardon  you  for  proffering 
advice,  and  venturing  to  prescribe  a  mode  of  life  to 
me  under  which  I  should  give  up  mental  strain 
and  vigils  and  my  usual  tasks,  and  should  nurse 
my  age,  worn  out  with  years  and  study,  in  the  lap 
of  ease  and  sleep.  Nay,  it  is  not  pardon  but 
thanks  that  I  give  you,  recognising  your  love  for 
me,  which  makes  you  in  my  behalf  what  you  never 
are  in  your  own,  a  physician.  But  bear  with  me,  I 
entreat  you,  in  that  I  obey  not  your  orders,  and 
believe  that  even  if  I  were  most  greedy  of  life, 
which  I  am  not,  still  if  I  were  to  rule  me  by  your 
advice,  I  should  but  die  the  sooner.  Constant  toil 
and  strain  are  food  to  my  spirit  ;  when  once  I  begin 


300     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

to  rest  and  slacken,  I  shall  soon  cease  to  live.  I 
know  my  own  strength  ;  I  am  not  fit  for  other 
labours  ;  but  this  of  reading  and  writing,  in  which 
you  bid  me  slacken,  is  light  toil,  nay  rather  'tis  a 
pleasant  rest,  and  breeds  forgetfulness  of  heavy 
labours.  There  is  no  nimbler  or  more  delightful 
burden  than  the  pen ;  other  pleasures  flee  away, 
and  do  you  a  mischief  even  while  they  soothe  you  ; 
your  pen  soothes  you  in  the  taking  up,  and  delights 
you  in  the  laying  down  of  it ;  and  it  works  profit 
not  only  to  its  master  but  to  many  besides,  often 
even  to  the  absent,  and  sometimes  to  posterity  after 
thousands  of  years.  I  think  I  speak  absolute  truth 
when  I  say  that  of  all  earthly  delights,  as  there  is 
none  more  honourable  than  literature,  so  there  is 
none  more  lasting  or  sweeter  or  more  constant ; 
none  which  plays  the  comrade  to  its  possessor  with 
so  easily  gotten  an  equipment  or  with  so  total  a 
lack  of  irksomeness.  .  .  .  This  do  I  desire  for 
myself,  that  when  death  overtakes  me,  he  may  find 
me  either  reading  or  writing  or,  if  Christ  so  will  it, 
praying  and  in  tears." 

Just  before  this  letter  was  written — so  strangely 
ignorant  could  he  be  of  the  vernacular  works  of  his 
friends — he  had  read  the  Decameron  for  the  first 
time,  and  had  pleased  himself  by  composing  in 
Latin  a  free  rendering  of  the  tale  of  Griselda.  An 
Englishman  may  note  with  keen  pleasure  that  the 
story  selected  by  Petrarch  for  this  tribute  of  admira- 
tion was  one  of  those  which  kindled  the  imagination 
of  our  own  great  master  in  the  art  of  narrative 
poetry.      This  association  of  the  names  of  Petrarch, 


THE    LAST   YEARS  301 

Boccaccio,  and  Chaucer  is  no  mere  accidental  stroke 
of  crood  luck;  the  connection  between  them  illus- 
trates,  better  perhaps  than  any  other  single  event, 
the  literary  history  of  the  early  Renaissance.  Pet- 
rarch's work,  as  we  have  seen,  was  to  spread  the 
knowledge  of  the  classical  authors,  and  revive  their 
spirit  as  the  dominant  intellectual  force  of  the 
world  ;  he  accomplished  this  almost  entirely  through 
the  medium  of  Latin.  The  choice  was  a  wise  one, 
because  it  gave  him  all  the  scholars  of  Europe  for 
audience ;  but  the  unlettered  could  feel  his  influence 
only  at  second  hand.  Boccaccio  carried  the  diffusion 
of  the  humanistic  spirit  a  long  step  further  by 
breathing  it  into  the  vernacular  literature  of  Italy. 
Chaucer  in  his  turn  did  for  England  what  Boccaccio 
had  done  for  Italy  ;  with  him  the  spirit  of  the  new 
learning  speaks  in  our  national  song  and  begins 
to  mould  our  national  life.  Chaucer  himself  was 
well  aware  of  the  source  from  which  his  inspiration 
flowed.  It  is  very  possible  that  the  Clerk  of  Oxen- 
forde's  ProloQ-ue  alludes  to  an  actual  meetino-  with 
Petrarch  at  Padua  in  the  summer  or  early  autumn 
of  1373-  However  this  may  be,  the  words  of  that 
prologue  make  it  clear  that  Chaucer  knew  Pet- 
rarch's Latin  version  of  the  story,  and  recognised  in 
its  author  a  master  and  chief  among  poets.  The 
clerk  tells  a  tale — 

Lerned  at  Padowe  of  a  worthy  clerk, 
As  provyd  by  his  wordes  and  his  werk. 
He  is  now  deed,  and  nayled  in  his  chest, 
Now  God  yive  his  soule  wel  good  rest ! 
Fraunces  Petrark,  the  laureat  poete, 
Highte  this  clerk,  whos  rethorique  swete 
Enlumynd  al  Ytail  of  poetrie. 


302      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

These  letters  to  Boccaccio  are  not  quite  the  last 
product  of  Petrarch's  unwearied  pen,  for  de  Sade  is 
undoubtedly  mistaken  in  ascribing  his  version  of 
the  Griselda  to  the  last  month  of  his  life  ;  but,  by  a 
happy  neglect  of  exact  chronological  sequence,  they 
have  been  made  to  form  the  last  book  of  the  Letters 
written  in  Old  Age.  There  is  a  beautiful  fitness  in 
the  arrangement  which  makes  his  correspondence 
close  with  these  admirable  letters  to  the  friend  who 
was  his  peer. 

He  kept  the  promise  which  he  had  so  lately  made 
in  them.  Death  found  him  at  work.  The  contra- 
dictions of  evidence  which  beset  so  many  incidents 
of  his  life  throw  some  uncertainty  over  the  exact 
details  of  his  death.  One  account  states  that  he 
died  in  Lombardo's  arms  on  July  i8th  ;  another,  at 
least  as  well  supported  by  evidence  and  preferable 
in  sentiment,  represents  that  he  was  found  dead  in 
his  library,  with  the  unfinished  epitome  of  the  Lives 
of  Illustrious  Men  on  the  desk  before  him,  on  the 
morning  of  July  20th,  his  seventieth  birthday. 


CHAPTER   XIX 
CONCLUSION   AND   SUMMARY 

PETRARCH'S  funeral  was  celebrated  at  Arqua 
with  great  pomp  ;  Francesco  da  Carrara  might 
be  trusted  to  see  to  that.  He  himself  attended  with 
a  train  of  courtiers  ;  four  bishops  took  part  in  the 
ceremony,  and  the  bier  was  carried  by  sixteen 
doctors  of  law.  Petrarch's  body  was  dressed  in  a 
red  gown,  according  to  some  the  royal  robe  which 
Robert  of  Naples  had  given  him  for  his  crowning ; 
according  to  others  the  dress  of  a  Canon  of  Padua. 
The  little  chapel  which  he  had  hoped  to  dedicate  to 
the  Virgin  had  never  been  built.  He  was  therefore 
buried  temporarily  in  the  parish  church,  and  six 
years  later  in  the  sarcophagus  of  the  rather  clumsy 
Paduan  type  constructed  for  the  purpose  by  his  son- 
in-law.  It  is  disofustinor  to  have  to  add  that  his 
bones  were  not  allowed  to  rest  undisturbed.  At  a 
time  when  the  tomb  stood  in  need  of  repair,  an  arm 
was  stolen  which  is  said  to  be  now  preserved  at 
Madrid  ;  and  among  the  relics  kept  in  Petrarch's 
house  the  caretaker  shows,  with  misplaced  satisfac- 
tion, a  box  which  contains  one  of  the  poet's  fingers. 
His  epitaph  may  best  be  read,  not  in  the  jingling 
Latin  triolet  composed  by  himself,  and  still  legible 
on  his   tomb,   but    in    the   testimony  borne   to  his 

303 


304      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

genius  by  the  man  who  could  most  adequately 
appreciate  it.  "Your  lamentable  letter,  my  dearest 
brother,"  wrote  Boccaccio  to  Francesco  da  Brossano, 
"  reached  me  on  October  20th  ;  I  did  not  recognise 
the  writing,  but,  after  undoing  the  knot  and  looking 
at  the  signature,  I  knew  at  once  what  I  was  to  read 
in  the  letter,  namely,  the  happy  passing  of  our  illus- 
trious father  and  teacher,  Francesco  Petrarca,  from 
this  earthly  Babylon  to  Jerusalem  above.  In  truth, 
although  none  of  our  friends  save  you  had  written 
me  the  news,  I  had  long  since,  to  my  exceeding 
sorrow,  heard  it  bruited  about  by  universal  report, 
and  for  some  days  together  I  had  wept  almost  with- 
out intermission,  not  for  his  ascent,  but  because  I 
found  myself  left  in  bereavement  and  misery.  And 
no  wonder  :  for  no  mortal  man  ever  stood  closer  to 
me  than  he.  .  .  .  And  when  I  saw  and  read  your 
letter,  I  fell  to  weeping  again  for  almost  a  whole 
night."  Then,  after  much  praise  of  Petrarch's 
piety  and  some  tender,  thoughtful  messages  to  "my 
sister  Tullia,"  Boccaccio  goes  on  to  say  that,  as  a 
Florentine,  he  must  grudge  to  Arqua  the  guardian- 
ship of  the  illustrious  dead  "  whose  noble  breast  was 
the  choicest  dwelling-place  of  the  Muses  and  all  the 
company  of  Helicon,  a  shrine  devoted  to  Philosophy 
and  most  rich  in  store  of  liberal  arts ;  yea,  a  mirror 
and  glory  of  such  arts,  and  especially  of  that  one 
which  concerns  itself  with  Ciceronian  eloquence,  as 
his  writings  clearly  testify."  The  sailor,  who  brings 
his  cargo  from  far  lands  to  the  head  of  the  Adriatic 
and  sees  the  tops  of  the  Euganean  hills  against  the 
sky,  will  say  to  himself  and  his  companions  that 


CONCLUSION    AND    SUMMARY    305 

"  in  the  bosom  of  those  hills  lies  he  who  was  the 
world's  glory,  the  temple  of  all  learning,  Petrarch, 
the  poet  of  sweet  speech,  whom  kindly  Rome  decked 
with  the  triumphal  laurel,  whose  many  noble  books 
live  to  herald  forth  his  most  sacred  fame."  Similarly, 
in  his  book  on  the  Genealogies  of  the  Gods,  written 
some  years  earlier,  Boccaccio  had  spoken  of  "  Fran- 
cesco Petrarca,  the  Florentine,  my  most  revered 
teacher,  father,  and  lord,  ...  a  man  who  should  be 
counted  among  the  company  of  the  illustrious 
ancients  rather  than  among  modern  men  :  who  is 
acknowledged  for  a  chief  poet,  I  will  not  say  merely 
by  the  Italians,  whose  singular  and  everlasting  glory 
he  is,  but  also  in  France,  in  Germany,  and  in  that 
most  distant  corner  of  the  earth,  England,  and  by 
many  of  the  Greeks.  ...  Now  there  lie  open  to  us 
many  works  of  his,  both  in  verse  and  prose,  most 
worthy  to  be  commemorated,  which  bear  to  and  fro 
the  sure  testimony  of  his  heavenly  talent." 

Similar  testimonies  might  be  multiplied  from  the 
writings  of  Benvenuto  da  Imola,  from  Coluccio 
Salutati,  and  others.  But  enough  has  been  said 
to  show  that  those  contemporaries  of  Petrarch  who 
were  best  qualified  to  judge,  unanimously  esteemed 
him  their  master  and  leader  in  learning.  From  this 
leadership  he  derives  his  claim  to  rank  among  those 
who  have  inaugurated  new  eras  and  changed  the  cur- 
rent of  the  world's  intellectual  history.  It  is  not  pre- 
tended that  he  was  the  sole  scholar  of  his  day.  He 
had  predecessors  in  the  so-called  Dark  Ages,  whose 
enthusiasm  for  the  classical  authors  known  to  them 
was  as  great  as  his  own  ;  in  every  country  that  he 


X 


3o6     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 

visited  he  found  contemporaries  zealous  for  learn- 
ing ;  he  had  devoted  pupils  and  fellow-workers  who 
shared  his  hig-h  aims  and  rivalled  even  his  indefatis"- 
able  industry.  What  distinguishes  him  from  all  the 
rest  is  the  wonderful  power  of  his  influence.  Pre- 
ceding scholars  had  been  quite  unable  to  make 
scholarship  a  power  in  the  world ;  men  did  not 
chano^e  their  modes  of  thoug-ht  in  the  twelfth 
century  because  John  of  Salisbury  wrote  good 
Latin,  or  in  the  early  fourteenth  because  Richard 
de  Bury  composed  Philobiblon.  But  with  Petrarch, 
and  because  of  him,  the  classical  spirit  resumed  its 
sway ;  people  without  the  least  pretensions  to 
scholarship  began  to  think  and  talk  in  the  ways 
approved  by  scholars;  the  leaven  of  "the  human- 
ities" leavened  the  whole  lump  of  society. 

It  is  not  possible  precisely  to  define  the  quality  of 
temperament  which  enabled  Petrarch  to  communi- 
cate the  spirit  which  others  had  only  been  able  to 
possess  ;  "  charm  "  affords  the  only  explanation,  and 
charm  defies  analysis.  It  is  evident  from  his  whole 
career  that  he  possessed  both  intellectual  and 
personal  charm  to  a  rare  degree ;  he  fascinated 
men's  imasfination  and  fired  their  hearts.  Entire 
strangers  came  as  pilgrims  aglow  with  enthusiasm 
to  Vaucluse,  and  having  seen  the  poet,  they  went 
back  to  spread  the  fame  of  him  through  all  lands. 
So  his  reputation  grew,  and  his  influence  became 
more  potent  every  day ;  and  the  studies  that  he 
loved,  from  being  the  monopoly  of  a  handful  of 
scholars,  became  the  inspiration  of  the  world's 
culture. 


CONCLUSION   AND   SUMMARY   307 

The  triumph  was  far  more  than  a  mere  intellectual 
success  ;  it  was  a  triumph  of  personality  and  char- 
acter, and  like  all  great  spiritual  triumphs,  it  was 
hardly  won.  Petrarch  enjoyed  moments  of  intense 
happiness,  but  he  was  not  a  happy  man  ;  his  life 
was  one  of  storm  and  stress,  of  anxious  self-ques- 
tioning, and  of  severe  emotional  conflict.  The  very 
humanity,  by  virtue  of  which  he  quickened  the  souls 
of  others,  gave  his  own  soul  for  a  prey  to  warring 
passions;  only  by  such  spiritual  pangs  could  the  new 
birth  be  accomplished. 

Surely  it  is  precisely  this  human  sensitiveness, 
this  intensity  of  nature,  which  most  endears  him  to 
us.  He  had  his  faults ;  who  cares  to  remember 
them  ?  or  rather  who  would  do  this  olorious  man 
the  disservice  of  caring  to  conceal  them  ?  and  who 
shall  stand  in  the  judgment  if  this  man  falls  ?  As  a 
consummate  artist  he  wins  our  admiration;  as  father 
of  the  new  learning  he  claims  our  filial  piety ;  but 
most  of  all  we  love  and  cherish  in  him  the  eager 
student,  the  passionate  devotee  of  high  ideals,  the 
incomparable  friend. 


INDEX 


Acciaiuoli,  Angelo,  Bishop  of 
Florence,  156-7,  169 

Acciaiuoli,  Niccolo,  Grand  Senes- 
chal of  Naples,  168-9,  i75>  192, 
203,214 

Accursio,  Mainardo :  his  character 
and  friendship  with  P.,  50-1  ; 
his  visit  to  Parma  and  murder 
by  brigands,  143-4 

Africa,  P.'s  epic  poem  :  begun  at 
Vaucluse,  go  ;  resumed  in  the 
Silva  Plana  and  finished  at 
Parma,  104  ;  its  history  and 
appreciation  of  it,  224-7  ;  lines 
falsely  supposed  to  have  been 
taken  from  Silius,  ib. 

Aix-la-Chapelle,  58 

Albanzani,  Donato  degli,  260-1, 
262 

Albert],  v.  Innocent  VI 

Albizzi,  Francesco  degli,  137 

Albornoz,  Cardinal,  182,  194,  248 

Aldus,  his  cursive  type  not  copied 
from  P.'s  handwriting,  86 

Ammirato,  Scipione,  250 

Ancestors  of  P.,  2 

Andrew  of  Hungary,  1 1 1,  113,  1 20 

Anguillara,  Orso  dell',  75  ;  as 
Senator  crowns  P.,  97-9 

Anna,  Empress,  198 

Annibaldi,  Paolo,  78,  98 

Apology  in  answer  to  a  Fre/ich- 
7na7i,  286 

Ardennes,  forest,  60 

Arezzo,  P.'s  birthplace,  7,  8  ;  P.'s 
visit,  152 

Aristotle,  265 

Arqua:  P.'s  first  visit,  282  ;  house- 
hold expenses,  287-8  ;  descrip- 
tion of,  288-9  ;  P.  forced  to 
leave,  291 ;  his  death  and  burial 
there,  302-3 


Astrologer  interrupts  P.'s  harangue 
at  Milan,  184 

Augustine,  St. :  the  De  Civitate 
Dei  and  the  Cotifessions,  56 ; 
P.'s  enthusiasm  for  him,  56-7  ; 
"Sors"  taken  on  Mont  Ventoux, 
70-1  ;  Commentary  on  Psalms 
given  to  P.  by  Boccaccio,  210 ; 
P.  gives  Confessions  to  Marsili, 
267-8 

Averroists,  265-6 

Avignon :  Petracco  goes  there, 
13  ;  seat  of  Papacy,  14  ;  lack  of 
accommodation,  15  ;  P.'s  hatred 
of,  28  ;  advantages  of  residence 
there,  28-30  ;  society  there, 
30-1  ;  papal  palace  begun,  79  ; 
P.'s  flight  from,  89  ;  his  return 
from  Italy,  107  ;  P.  leaves  in 
1343,  in;  returns  in  1345,  1 17  ; 
leaves  again  in  1347,  131  ; 
ravages  of  the  plague,  140  ;  re- 
visited, 156,  164  ;  P.'s  last  visit, 
176  ;  Nelli  visited  there  by 
Giovanni,  213 

Azzo  da  Correggio,  v.  Correggio 

Baiani,  Ghilberto,  136 
Bailiff's  wife  at  Vaucluse,  159-60 
Bale,  earthquake,  196-7 
Banditti,  97,  102,  114,  143-4,  I74 
Barbato,    Marco :    P.'s    intimacy 

with,  96-7,    113;   the   Poetical 

Letters  dedicated  to  him,  216; 

his  death,  243 
Bardi,  Roberto  de',  Chancellor  of 

Paris  University,  93 
Barili,  Giovanni,  96,  97,  113,  203 
Barlaam,  Abbot :    meets  P.,  89  ; 

Boccaccio's  description  of  him, 

ib. ;  his  mission  to  Avignon,  90 ; 

revisits  Avignon  and  begins  to 


309 


3IO     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 


teach  P.  Greek  and  learn 
Latin  from  him,  io8  ;  Bishop 
of  Geraci,  ib. 

Beaume,  Ste.,  88 

Beccaria,  the,  of  Pavia,  195, 198-9, 
252 

Benedict  XI,  Pope,  6 

Benedict  XII,  Pope  :  his  election, 
64  ;  friendly  to  P.,  ib.  ;  P.'s  first 
letter  to  him,  65  ;  gives  P.  pre- 
ferment, ib.  ;  P.'s  second  letter, 
79,  cf.  272  ;  begins  palace  at 
Avignon,  ib.  ;  sanctions  the 
Correggi's  schemes,  102-3  ;  his 
death,  107 

Benintendi  de'  Ravegnani,  246 

Benvenuto  da  Imola,  v.  Imola 

Bergamo,  207-8 

Boccaccio  :  P.'s  letter  to  him  on 
culture  and  religion,  57  ;  his 
description  of  the  Plague,  135  ; 
character,  genius,  and  friend- 
ship with  P.,  148-50  ;  date  of 
their  first  meeting  and  earliest 
extant  correspondence,  151-2; 
brings  P.  decree  revoking  his 
banishment,  153;  his  remon- 
strance in  form  of  a  pastoral 
dialogue,  179-80;  admired  P.'s 
Invectiva,  193  ;  visits  P.  in 
Milan,  209-11 ;  their  commerce 
of  books,  210  ;  lettei's  to  him, 
ib.  ;  Boccaccio's  grievance,  ib.  ; 
sends  P.  the  Divitia  Cofnmedia, 
211  ;  his  enthusiasm  for  P.'s 
Letters,  219;  also  for  the  Africa 
and  for  P.'s  treatises,  225-7  ; 
eulogy  of  P.,  229  ;  his  descrip- 
tion of  Fr.  da  Brossano,  235  ; 
frightened  by  a  supposecl  reve- 
lation ;  P.'s  noble  letter  thereon, 
236-41  ;  visit  to  Venice,  242-3  ; 
P.'s  cry  of  anguish  in  letter  to 
him,  243  ;  letters  to  him,  253-7  ; 
his  rank  as  poet,  ib.  ;  visits 
Avignon,  ib.  ;  anxious  about 
P.'s  independence,  259;  visits 
Venice,  but  misses  P.,  280-1  ; 
P.  rejects  B.'s  advice  to  cease 
work,  294-300 ;  the  Tale  of 
Grisclda,  300-1  ;  P.,  B.,  and 
Chaucer,  ib.  ;  B.'s  grief  at  P.'s 
death  and  eulogy  of  him,  304-5 


Bohemia,  John,  King  of,  v.  John 
Bologna  :  P.  at  University,  21-3; 

P.  leaves,  24;  papal  castle  built, 

63-4,  115;  state  after  war,  248  ; 

Pope  Urban's  funeral,  284 
Bolsena,  152 
Boniface  VIII,  Pope,  4 
Book-hunting,  43 
Borromeo,  Cardinal,  87 
Boulogne,  Cardinal  Gui  de,  164 
Bretigny,  Peace  of,  230 
Brossano,     Francesco     da,     P.'s 

son-in-law,  235,  264,  281,  303, 

304 
Bruno,  Francesco,  244,  251,  261, 

269,  287 
Bucoliciiin  Carmen.,  v.  Eclogues 
Buonconvento,  13 
Bury,  Richard  de,  53,  306 
Bussolari,  Fra  Jacopo  :  his  revo- 
lution   in    Pavia,    198-9 ;    P.'s 
shameful    letter    to    him,   ib.  ; 
his     heroism     and    surrender, 
251-3 

Cabassoles,  Philip  de,  Bishop  of 
Cavaillon  :  lineage,  character, 
and  friendship  with  P.,  83-4  ; 
at  Naples,  112;  at  Cavaillon 
and  Vaucluse,  119-20;  the  De 
Vita  Sol.  dedicated  to  him,  ib.., 
cf  256  ;  P.  and  Socrates  visit 
him,  1 20-1  ;  P.'s  last  visit 
to  Cavaillon,  174-5  '■>  letters, 
245  ;  his  promotion,  ib. ;  meets 
Boccaccio,  256  ;  Cardinal  and 
Bishop  of  Sabina,  281-2  ;  Le- 
gate in  Umbria,  and  death,  291 

Ceesars,  medals  of,  191 

Caloria,  Tommaso,  22-3,  106 

Canigiani,  v.  Eletta 

Cafizoiiierc :  special  character- 
istics, 38-9 ;  Italian  and  Pro- 
vencal influences,  40 ;  reflects 
P.'s  individuality,  ib.  ;  its  imi- 
tators, ib.  ;  its  contents,  40-2  ; 
tone  of  the  second  part,  139  ; 
place  in  literary  history,  222 

Capitol,  V.  Rome 

Capra,  Enrico,  207-8 

Capranica,  74-7 

Cardinals,  Commission  on  Roman 
affairs,  169 


INDEX 


1 1 


Carpentras :  P.  taken  to  live  there, 
1 5  ;  death  of  Clement  V  there, 
lb.  ;  P.  goes  to  school,  i6  j 
canonry,  250 

Carpi,  141 

Carrara,  Francesco  da,  lord  of 
Padua  :  friendship  with  P.,  65, 
cf.  292  ;  Vicar  Imperial,  189- 
90;  defeated  by  Venice,  291-2  ; 
attends  P.'s  funeral,  303 

Carrara,  Francesco  Novello  da, 
292 

Carrara,  Jacopo  1 1  da:  friendship 
with  P.,  65,  141-2  ;  character, 
ib.  ;  procures  P.  canonry  at 
Padua,  ib.  ;  death  and  P.'s 
grief,  154;  epitaph,  155 

Castiglionchio,  v.  Lapo 

Cavaillon,  Bishop  of,  v.  Cabas- 
soles 

Cavaillon,  city,  83,  174 

Celso,  Giulio,  229 

Celso,  Lorenzo,  Doge,  248-50 

Charles,  Duke  of  Normandy, 
afterwards  Dauphin,  231 

Charles  IV,  Emperor :  as  Prince 
of  Bohemia  commands  his 
father's  troops  in  Italy,  54  ;  his 
election  as  King  of  the  Romans, 
187;  P.'s  letters  to  him,  189; 
invites  P.  to  his  Court,  ib. ;  his 
compact  with  the  Pope,  ib.  ; 
arrival  in  Italy  and  disappoint- 
ments, coronation  in  Milan  and 
Rome,  and  return  to  Germany, 
1S9-93  ;  P.'s  visit  and  exhorta- 
tions to  him,  190-1  ;  crowns 
Zanobi,  192  ;  secret  hostility 
to  the  Visconti,  195  ;  P.'s 
embassy  to  him,  196-7  ;  his 
Golden  Bull,  197  ;  embellish- 
ment of  Prague,  ib.  ;  creates 
P.  Count  Palatine,  198  ;  gift 
of  drinking-cup  with  invitation, 
232  ;  P.'s  reply,  ib.  ;  P.  invited 
again,  starts,  but  is  forced  to 
turn  back,  236  ;  Charles  visits 
Rome  and  makes  mischief  in 
Tuscany,  284 

Charles  of  Valois,  his  mission 
to     Florence     and     treachery, 

4-5 
Chaucer,  300-1 


Church :  P.  enters,  27  ;  his  attacks 
on  and  loyalty  to,  271-2 

Ciano,  104 

Cicero  :  MSS.  of  the  Laws  and 
De  Gloria  lost,  17,  27  ;  P.'s 
boyish  admiration,  18  ;  MS.  of 
the  Rhetoric  spared  by  Petracco, 
20  ;  MSS.  at  Liege,  43-4  ;  P. 
finds  his  Leiters  at  Verona,  1 1 5- 
16  ;  P.'s  enthusiasm  for  C,  ib., 
and  his  two  letters  to  him,  ib. ; 
MSS.  lent  by  Lapo,  151  ;  epi- 
sode of  a  Ciceronian  enthusiast, 
155-6;  P.'s  MS.  of  C.'s  Letters 
injures  his  leg,  205-6 ;  MSS. 
copied  for  P.  by  Boccaccio,  2 10 ; 
P.'s  master  and  pattern,  221, 
cf  227 

Cino  da  Pistoia  :  never  P.'s  tutor, 
22  ;  exchange  of  poems  and 
influence  on  P.,  22,  40 

Clarence,  Lionel,  Duke  of,  279-80 

Classics  and  classical  literature, 
V.  Revival  of  learning 

Clement  V,  Pope,  11,  12;  re- 
moves Papacy  to  Avignon,  13; 
dies,  15 

Clement  VI,  Pope  ;  election  and 
character,  107  ;  favours  P.  and 
confers  many  benefices  on  him, 
108,  cf.  117;  offers  him  papal 
secretaryship,  117;  attitude  to 
Rienzi,  127,  129  ;  tries  to  re- 
concile Venice  and  Genoa, 
167-8  ;  mediates  in  troubles  at 
Naples,  168;  buys  countship  of 
Provence,  ib.  ;  appoints  Com- 
mission on  Roman  affairs,  169  ; 
imprisons  and  releases  Rienzi, 
170;  his  death,  171-2  ;  P.'s 
poetical  letter  to  him,  272 

Cola  di  Rienzo,  v.  Rienzi 

Cologne,  58-60 

Colonna,the :  formerly  Ghibellins, 
rallied  to  the  Pope,  45  ;  their 
feud  with  the  Orsini,  61  ;  their 
misgovernment  of  Rome,  127  ; 
slaughtered  by  Rienzi,  131,  133 

Colonna,  Agapito,  Bishop  of 
Luni,  50 

Colonna,  Agapito  the  Younger, 
269 

Colonna,  Agnese,  75,  T] 


312      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 


Colonna,Giacomo:  publishes  Bull 
of  excommunication  against 
Lewis  of  Bavaria,  45  ;  Bishop  of 
Lombez,  ib. ;  takes  P.  there,  46 ; 
their  friendship,  ib.  ;  presents 
P.  to  his  brother,  48 ;  his  return 
to  Rome,  60-1 ;  P.'s  ode  to  him, 
63  ;  his  bantering  letter  of  in- 
vitation to  P.,  72-3  ;  takes  P. 
to  Rome,  'j'j  ;  poetical  Latin 
letter  to,  79 ;  his  death  and 
apparition  to  P.,  106 

Colonna,  Giovanni,  Cardinal :  his 
pleasantry  with  Convennole,  16 ; 
receives  P.  into  his  household, 
48  ;  character  and  friendship 
for  P.,  48-50  ;  P.'s  letter  to  him 
from  Capranica,  75  ;  introduces 
P.  to  Dauphin  Humbert,  87  ; 
invited  to  sup  at  Vaucluse, 
91  ;  P.  consults  him  about  his 
coronation,  93-4  ;  probably  re- 
called P.  to  Avignon,  107  ;  P.'s 
letters  to  him  from  Naples, 
112;  strained  relations  and 
separation,  129-31  ;  his  death, 
140 

Colonna,  Giovanni  di  San  Vito, 

52,  n 

Colonna,  Stefano  il  Giovane  :  de- 
feats the  Orsini,  61  ;  escorts  P., 
"J'J  ;  Senator,  78 ;  expelled  fi'om 
Rome  by  Rienzi,  128  ;  killed  in 
battle  with  many  of  his  House, 

131 

Colonna,  Stefano  il  Vecchio : 
character  and  affection  for  P., 
51-2;  eulogises  P.,  99;  takes 
P.  to  Praeneste,  112;  sur- 
vives all  his  sons,  131,  140; 
P.'s  letter  of  condolence  to 
him,  ib. 

Colonna,  Stefano,  great-grandson 
of  old  Stefano,  268-9 

Coluccio,  V.  Salutati 

Company,  v.  Great  Company 

Convennole,  of  Prato :  P.'s  school- 
master, 16  ;  his  affection  for  P., 
ib. ;  helped  by  Petracco  and  P., 
ib. ;  loses  Cicero's  I)e  Gloria., 
17,  27  ;  his  return  to  Prato  and 
death  there,  17 

Copyists,  r>.  Revival  of  learning 


Corio,  252 

Coronation,  v.  Laurel 

Correggio,  Azzo  da  :  friendship 
with  P.,  65  ;  meets  him  at 
Avignon,  66 ;  P.  pleads  his 
cause,  67  ;  revisits  Avignon, 
88-9 ;  goes  with  P.  to  Naples, 
95,  and  Rome,  97  ;  regains 
Parma,  102-3  >  his  quarrels  and 
intrigues,  1 14-15  ;  a  refugee 
at  Verona,  116;  his  unhappy 
career  and  death,  235-6 

Corvara,  Abbey  and  Abbot  of, 
156-8 

Crete,  248-9 

Cristiano,  Luca,  of  Piacenza : 
character  and  friendship  with 
P.,  50-1  ;  letter  from  P.  to  him, 
142  ;  visit  to  Parma  and  ad- 
venture with  brigands,  143-4  ; 
P.  renounces  Canonry  in  his 
favour,  171 

Crown  of  Song,  v.  Laurel 

Dandolo,  Andrea,  Doge,  183,  246 

Dante:  of  the  White  Guelf  party, 
3  ;  eulogy  of  Henry  VII,  12  ; 
refuses  to  recant,  13;  view  of 
Rome  in  the  De  Monarchid,  74, 
cf.  123  ;  desired  laurel  crown, 
92,  cf.  211  ;  Divina  Commedia 
sent  to  P.  by  Boccaccio ;  P.'s 
letter  thereon,  21  i-i 2 ;  P.'s  sup- 
posed jealousy  of  him,  ib. ;  con- 
struction of  the  De  Monarchid, 
227 

Dauphin,  v.  Charles,  Humbert 

Decameron.,  v.  Boccaccio 

De  Contcmptu  Mundi:  quotations 
relating  to  Laura,  37,  139 ; 
composition  and  nature  of  the 
dialogues,  109-10 

De  Otio  Religiosorutn,  120 

De  Remediis  Utriusque  Fortunes: 
its  importance,  227;  dedicated 
to  Azzo  da  Correggio,  235 

De  Republica  optitne  adminis- 
tranda.,  188,  292-3 

De  sui  ipsius  et  jnultorum  igno- 
rantia,  266 

De  Viris  Illustribus :  P.'s  great 
history,  probably  begun  in  early 
years  at  Vaucluse,  90 ;  probable 


INDEX 


3^3 


allusion  to,  158  ;  still  unfinished 
in  1354,  191  ;  its  importance, 
228-9 

De  Vita  Solitaria:  its  dedication, 
84,  and  composition,  119-20; 
its  importance,  227  ;  finally 
copied,  256 

Despots,  Italian,  general  charac- 
teristics, 66-7 

Dionigi  da  Borgo  San  Sepolcro, 
Fra  :  intimate  relations  with  P. 
and  influence,  55-6  ;  letter  to 
him  with  account  of  ascent  of 
Mont  Ventoux, 67-71;  his  death, 
106-7,  cf.  207-8 

Domitian,  Emperor,  92 

Dondi  deir  Orologio,  193-4 

Doria,  Paganino,  183 

Eclogues,  P.'s  Latin  :  composed 
at  Vaucluse,9o;  th^Divoriiuin, 
130  ;  appreciation  of  them  and 
their  place  in  literary  history, 
223-4 

Eletta  Canigiani,  P.'s  mother :  her 
marriage,  3  ;  lives  at  Arezzo, 
6  ;  gives  birth  to  P.,  7  ;  lives 
at  Incisa,  8-9 ;  accompanies 
Petracco  to  Pisa,  11,  Avignon, 
13,  and  Carpentras,  15  ;  "best 
of  all  mothers,"  18  ;  her  death 
and  P.'s  eulogy  of  her,  24-5 

Eletta,  granddaughter  of  P.,  25, 

235 
Empire,  v.  Rome 
Enza,  River,  104 
EpistolcE^  V.  Letters 
Epitome  of  theZzz'^.y  of  Illustrious 

Men^  228,  260,  302 

Faliero,  Marino,  Doge,  247 
Ferrara,  battle,  55  ;   P.'s  illness, 

283 
Ferrara,  Marquis  of,  114,  141 
Flanders,  P.'s  travels  in,  58 
Florence  :     native    city    of    P.'s 
family,  2  ;  party  politics  of,  3-7  ; 
opposes  Henry  VII,  13,  Lewis 
of    Bavaria,   44,   and   John   of 
Bohemia,  54 ;  claims  Lucca,  88  ; 
P.'s   visits    in    1350,    148,    152; 
votes    P.'s    recall    from    exile 
and  restoration  of  his  property. 


1 53 ;  antagonism  to  Milan,  179- 

80  ;  plan  to  get  P.  a  Canonry, 

250 

Fournier,  Jacques,  z/.  Benedict  XII 

Fracassetti,    114,    177,    189,   251, 

262 
France,  state  after  war,  232 
Francesca :    daughter  of  P.,  84, 
no;  her  marriage,  235;  lives 
with  P.,  ib.;  "TuUia,"  281,  cf. 

304 
P^rancesco,  grandson  of  P.,  235, 

281 
Francesco  da  Brossano,  v.  Bros- 

sano 
Francesco  da  Carrara,  v.  Carrara 
Frignano,  Tommaso  da,  282-3 

Gabrini,  v.  Rienzi 

Garda,  Lago  di,  p.  116 

Garzo,  Ser,  P.'s  great  -  grand  - 
father,  2 

Genevre,  Mont,  156,  176 

Genoa,  14,  132  ;  war  with  Venice 
and  P.'s  letter  thereon,  167-8  ; 
defeat,  submission  to  Milan, 
and  victory,  82-4 ;  P.  gradually 
estranged  from,  246 

Ghent,  58 

Gherardo,  P.'s  brother :  born  at 
Incisa,  9;  goes  to  Bologna,  21 ; 
leaves  it  with  P.,  23 ;  lives  with 
him  at  Avignon,  31  ;  ascends 
Mont  Ventoux  with  him,  67-71 ; 
visits  the  Ste.  Beaume  and 
Montrieu,  88  ;  visited  by  P.  at 
Montrieu,  120;  P.'s  second  visit 
to  him  there,  174-5  >  his  heroic 
conduct,  ib. 

Ghibellin  :  general  tendency  of 
the  party,  4 ;  the  name  becomes 
a  mere  badge,  44 

Giovanni,  son  of  Petrarch  :  birth, 
character,  and  unhappy  rela- 
tions with  P.,  84-6  ;  at  school 
in  Verona,  116,  and  at  Parma, 
136;  leaves  Padua  with  P.,  155  ; 
appointed  Canon  of  V'erona, 
sent  there,  expelled,  and  returns 
to  P.'s  home,  184-5  !  expelled 
for  misconduct,  212-13  ;  death, 
P.'s  lamentation,  and  note  in 
the  Virgil,  233-4 


314     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 


Giovanni    Andrea,    Professor    of 

Law  and  P.'s  tutor,  21-2 
Giovanni    da    Firenze    gives    P. 

advice,  32 
Gladiatorial    games    at    Naples, 

112 
Gonzaga,  the,  of  Mantua,  147-8, 

190 
Great  Company,  135,  177,  275 
Greek,    P.'s    attempt    to    learn, 

108-9 
Gregory  XI,  Pope,  286-7 
Grimoard,  Cardinal,  279 
Grimoard,  Guillaume,  v.  Urban  V 
Grosseteste,  Robert,  100,  220 
Guelf:   general  tendency  of  the 
party,    4  ;     its    supremacy    in 
Florence,  ib.  ;    feud  of  White 
and    Black    Guelfs,    id.  ;     the 
White    Guelf   pohtical    creed, 
123,  188,  270 
Guido,  Don,  157-8 
Guido  Settimo,  v.  Settimo 
Gulielmo  da  Pastrengo,  v.  Past- 
rengo 

Henry  VII,  Emperor,  expedition 
to  Italy,  and  death,  11-13 

Homer :  P.'s  MS.  and  delight  in 
its  possession,  185-6;  trans- 
lation made  for  him,  257-8 

Humanism,  v.  Revival  of  learning 

Humbert  II,  Dauphin  of  Vienne, 
87-8 

Hungary,  v.  Andrew,  Lewis 

Imola,  Benvenuto  da,  294,  305 

Incisa,  P.'s  home  in  childhood, 
8-11 

Innocent  VI,  Pope  :  election  and 
character,  172-3  ;  threatens  to 
excommunicate  P.  as  wizard,  z'd. ; 
offers  P.  the  papal  secretaryship, 
204  ;  death,  242 

Isabelle  de  Valois,  230 

Italy  :  P.'s  passion  for,  v.  Odes  ; 
Rome :  his  salutation  from  Mont 
Genevre,  1 76  ;  rumoured  pro- 
ject of  invasion,  195-6 

Jacopo  II  da  Carrara,  v.  Carrara 
Joanna,    Queen    of    Naples,    83, 
111-13,  120,  168 


John,  King  of  Bohemia  :  his  in- 
vasion of  Italy,  53-5  ;  death  at 
Crdcy,  ib.,  cf.  187 

John,  King  of  France,  172,  230-1 

John  XXII,  Pope:  secretly  en- 
courages John  of  Bohemia, 
54-5  ;  his  Bull  against  Roman 
family  feuds,  61  ;  feigns  in- 
tention of  returning  to  Italy, 
62-3  ;  death  and  character,  64 

Jongleurs,  Provencal,  253 

Lcelius  :  his  real  name  Lello 
Stefani,  46  ;  lineage,  character, 
and  friendship  with  P.,  I'b.  ; 
sends  P.  bad  news  of  Rienzi, 
132;  P.'s  answer,  133;  letters 
to,  148,  191,  198 ;  waits  on 
Charles  IV,  192  ;  quarrel  and 
reconciliation  with  Socrates, 
201-3  ;  death,  243 

Lapo  da  Castiglionchio:  his  great 
erudition,  150-1  ;  exchanges 
books  with  P.,  zb.  ;  his  copy  of 
P.'s  letters,  t'b. 

Laura  :  P.'s  first  sight  of  her,  33  ; 
not  known  who  she  was,  33-6  ; 
allegorical  theory  combated, 
34-5,  cf.  72,  86  ;  effect  on  P.  of 
his  love  for  her,  36-9 ;  at 
Avignon,  53  ;  progress  and 
episodes  of  P.'s  love,  80,  81,  89, 
118;  death  of  L.  and  P.'s  entry 
on  the  Virgil  fly-leaf,  137-8; 
tone  of  his  later  poems,  138-9 

Laurel  Crown  of  Song  :  object  of 
P.'s  ambition,  72,  cf.  92  ;  its 
traditions,  92  ;  offered  from 
Rome  and  Paris,  zb. ;  conferred, 
97-101  ;  stimulates  P.  to  work, 
104  ;  V.  also  Dante 

Law  :  P.  compelled  to  study,  18- 
22  ;  abandons  the  study,  27 

Learning,  v.  Revival  of  learning 

Lello  Stefani,  v.  Lrelius 

Letter  to  Posterity,  138  ;  its  com- 
position and  significance,  293 

Letters,  P.'s  Latin  Poetical  : 
various  allusions  to,  53,  65,  79, 
119,  136,  184,  272  ;  arranged  in 
1359  and  dedicated  to  Barbato, 
216  ;  appreciation  of  them, 
222-3 


INDEX 


15 


Letters,  P.'s  Latin  Prose,  quoted  I 
passim:  many  written  in  135 1-3, 
1 58 ;  many  burnt,  216;  arrange- 
ment of  the  rest  and  dedication 
of  the  Familiar  Letters  to 
Socrates,  216-18,  cf.  263  ;  ap- 
preciation of  their  vaUie,  218, 
cf  222  ;  Ep.  Sefjiics,  217,  244-5  '■> 
Ep.  Sine  Titiilo,  218,  271 

Lewis  of  Bavaria,  Emperor  :  in- 
vasion of  Italy  and  coronation 
by  an  anti-pope,  44  ;  retreats 
from  Rome  and  Italy,  ib.  ;  en- 
courages and  then  opposes  John 
of  Bohemia,  53-4 ;  hostility  to 
the  Papacy,  excommunication 
and  death,  187 

Lewis  the  Fleming,  v.  Socrates 

Lewis  of  Hungary,  120,  135,  168, 
195-6 

Lewis  of  Tarentum,  120,  168 

Library,  P.'s :  "his  adopted  daugh- 
ter," 165-6  ;  intention  to  leave 
it  to  Venice  never  fulfilled,  241  ; 
its  dispersal,  242 

Liege :  P.'s  first  visit,  discovery 
of  MSS.  and  penury  of  ink, 
43-4  ;  his  second  visit,  58 

Literature,  v.  Revival  of  learn- 
ing 

Liternum,  or  Linternum,  P.'s  villa 
near  Milan,  213 

Lives  of  Illustrious  Men,  v.  De 
Viris,  etc. 

Loiera,  battle,  182-3 

Lombardo  della  Sete,or  da  Serico, 
260,  288,  302 

Lombez  :  P.'s  first  visit,  45-8  ;  P. 
obtains  Canonry  there,  65 

Luca  Cristiano,  v.  Cristiano 

Luzzera,  Castle,  148 

Lyons,  60 

Macchiavelli,  188,  293 
Mainardo  Accursio,  v.  Accursio 
Malatesta,  the,  of  Rimini,  194 
Malatesta,  Carlo,  262 
Malatesta,  Pandolfo,  194-5,  289 
Mantua,     114,     136,     141,     147, 

190 
Marsili,  Luigi,  266-8 
Martini,  Simone,  commonlycalled 

Memmi,  29 


Milan  (?'.  also  Visconti) :  though 
Ghibellin,  opposes  Lewis  of 
Bavaria,  44,  and  John  of  Bo- 
hemia, 54  ;  P.'s  Virgil  there, 
86-7  ;  leagued  with  Mantua 
against  Ferrara  and  Parma, 
114;  P.'s  house  near  Church 
of  St.  Ambrose,  179  ;  antagon- 
ism to  Florence,  179-80;  long 
exempt  from  plague,  181  ; 
Charles  IV receives  Iron  Crown, 
igi-2  ;  Boccaccio  visits  P., 
209-1 1  ;  P.'s  house  robbed,  213  ; 
P.  migrates  to  monastery  of 
San  Simpliciano,  213-14;  P. 
returns  from  France,  232  ;  his 
connection  becomes  less  inti- 
mate, 246  ;  marriage  of  Duke 
of  Clarence,  279-80 

Miliaiino,  Priory  of  S.  Nicholas, 
108 

Minstrels,     wandering      Italian, 

253-4 
Modena,  115;  Canonry  there,  171 
Monet,  Raymond  :   P.'s  bailiff  at 

Vaucluse,  162  ;   his  death  and 

eulogy,  164-7 
Montferrat,  Marquis  of,  195,  252 
Montpellier,  P.  studies  law,  18 
Montrieu,  Monastery,  v.  Gherardo 

Naples,  P.'s  first  visit,  94-7  ;  title 
of  its  king,  ib.  ;  anarchy  and 
corruption  after  Robert's  death, 
1 10-13;  pacification  of,  167-8, 
V.  also  Robert 

Napoleon,  8,  87 

Nelli,  Francesco,  Prior  of  the 
Church  of  the  Holy  Apostles 
at  Florence,  called  Simonides 
by  P.  :  their  meeting  and  close 
friendship,  150,  cf  209  ;  favours 
Don  Ubertino,  156-7;  letters 
to  him,  159,  196,  210,  233,  235  ; 
remonstrates  with  P.,  179-80; 
young  Giovanni  visits  him,  213  ; 
his  death,  243 

Oczko,  Johann,  Bishop  of  Olmutz, 
197 

Odes :  Che  debb'  to  far,  140 ;  Italia 
Mia,  42,  54,  176-7  ;  O  aspettatUy 
63  ;  Spirto  Gentil,  42,  1 26 


i6      PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 


Olympius,  51 
Orsini,  the,  61,  74,  127 
Orso,  V.  Anguillara 
Otio  Religiosorum^  De,  v.  De  Otio 
Religiosorutn 

Padua,  136,  1 41-2  ;  P.'s  Canonry 
there,  ib.  ;  translation  of  St. 
Anthony's  body,  147  ;  P.  leaves 
in  [351,  154  ;  Charles  IV  visits, 
189;  P.  in  residence  there,  209, 
236,  248,  278,  291  ;  defeat  by 
Venice,  291-2 

Paganino  Bizozero,  144-5 

Paleologo,  V.  Montferrat 

Papacy,  v.  Avignon,  Giielf,  Rome 

Pardowitz,  Ernest  von,  Archbishop 
of  Prague,  197 

Parenzo,  Ser,  P.'s  grandfather,  2 

Paris :  P.'s  first  visit,  55,  58  ;  offers 
P.  the  laurel,  93  ;  P.'s  visit  as 
Ambassador  to  King  John, 
230-1  ;  Marsili's  repute  there, 
267 

Parma :  feud  of  Correggi  and 
Rossi,  66  ;  expulsion  of  Vero- 
nese and  entry  of  Correggi, 
102-4 ;  P.  settles  there,  104 ; 
his  second  stay  and  escape 
during  siege,  1 13-15  ;  P.  made 
Canon  and  Archdeacon,  117; 
P.'s  home  in  1348-9,  136,  142  ; 
subsequent     residence     there, 

147 
Pastrengo,  Gulielmo  da,  66-7,  89, 

116,  148,  185 
Patras,  Archbishop  of,  249 
Pavia,  198-200,  251-3,  278 
Peschiera,  116 
Pestilence,  7'.  Plague 
Peter  of  Poitiers,  v.  Poitiers 
Peter    of    Siena,    his    supposed 

vision,  237 
Petracco,  Ser,  P.'s  father,  2  ; 
position,  marriage,  condemna- 
tion, and  banishment,  3,  5  ; 
envoy  for  his  party,  6  ;  visits 
Incisa  by  stealth,  9  ;  goes  to 
Pisa,  12;  leaves  Italy  and  settles 
in  Provence,  13-15  ;  talent  for 
literature,  18;  first  encourages, 
then  prohibits  P.'s  classical 
studies,  18-19;  burns  P.'s  books, 


19-20  ;  death  and  character, 
24  ;  his  fortune  stolen  by  the 
trustees,  26 

Philip  VI,  King  of  France  :  in 
league  with  John  of  Bohemia, 
54  ;  promises  to  lead  Crusade, 
62  ;  drops  project,  63 

Philobiblon^  53,  306 

Philosophy  :  badly  taught  at  the 
Universities,  21;  P.'s  conception 
of,  227  ;  mediaeval  conception, 
lb.  ;  the  Averroists,  265-6 

Physicians:  P.'s  feud  with,  17 1-2  ; 
his  hivectiva  contra  Medicum, 
193  ;  fortunate  disobedience  to, 
289-90 

Piacenza,  156,  192 

Pilato,  Leonzio,  243,  257-9 

Pirro,  Antonio,  saved  P.'s  Virgil, 

87 
Pisa,  11-13,  102,  135,  190,  192 
Pistoia,  origin  of  the  White  and 

Black  Guelf  feud,  4 
Pistoia,  Cino  da,  v.  Cino 
Plague,  the  Great,  135-7, 140, 181, 

233-6,  243 
Po,  P.'s  voyage  in  time  of  war, 

280 
Poetry  :  P.'s  vocation,  27  ;  medi- 
aeval doctrine  of,  223  ;    "  most 

glorious  of  the  arts,"  294 
Poetry,  Provencal,  29,  39,  253 
Poggetto,  Cardinal,  Papal  Legate, 

61-2 
Poitiers,  Peter  of:  visits  Vaucluse, 

82  ;  meets  P.  in  Paris,  231-2 
Pommieres,  de,  v.  Sagramor 
Pontremoli,    blind    schoolmaster 

of,  105 
Porto  Lungo,  183 
Prague,  P.  visits,  197 
Prato,   Convennole  da,   v.   Con- 

vennole 
Prato  Magno,  9,  10 
Prato,     Niccolo     da.     Cardinal, 

Legate  in  Tuscany,  6,  7 

Quintilian,  his  Institutions  and 
P.'s  letter  to  him,  152 

Ravenna,  Giovanni  da,  262 
Ravennas,  Adolescens,  262-4 
Razzolini,  Luigi,  229 


INDEX 


317 


Reggio,  104,  114 

Renaissance,?'.  Revival  of  learning 

Reports  of  P.'s  death,  false, 
250 

Revival  of  learning  :  P.  devotes 
himself  to  it,  27  ;  literature  as 
a  profession,  ib.  ;  P.  diligent  in 
collecting  MSS.,  43  ;  his  view 
of  the  right  relation  between 
culture  and  religion,  56-7,  cf. 
238-41  ;  P.'s  coronation  marks 
important  epoch  in,  loo-i  ;  P.'s 
zeal  and  work  for,  105,  cf.  305  ; 
P.  accepted  as  its  prophet,  141  ; 
general  spread  of  the  move- 
ment, ib.  ;  P.'s  industry  in  copy- 
ing MSS.  and  generosity  in 
employing  copyists,  147  ;  his 
complaints  against  copyists,  ib.., 
cf.  151,  257,  287  ;  his  Greek 
MSS.  of  Homer  and  Plato, 
185-6  ;  importance  of  P.'s  Latin 
writings  in  furthering  the  move- 
ment, 219-27  ;  sense  in  which 
P.  is  rightly  called  the  Founder 
of  Humanism,  219-20,  cf.  229, 
305-6  ;  his  valuable  conception 
of  continuity  of  history,  221  ; 
his  revival  of  the  critical  spirit, 
ib.  ;  P.  took  men  back  to  the 
Ciceronian  standpoint,  ib.,  cf. 
227  ;  and  to  that  of  the  classical 
historians,  228 

Rhine,  the ;  riverside  ceremony 
58  ;  earthquake  throughout  the 
valley,  196 

Rhone,  the,  "windiest  of  rivers," 
28  ;  P.'s  joy  at  sight  of,  60 

Rienzi,  122-34  (chap.  VII.)  pas- 
sim; prisoner  at  Avignon,  170 

Rime,  v.  Canzoniere 

Rinaldo  da  Villafranca,  116,  185 

Rinucci,  v.  Nelli 

Robert,  Friar,  112 

Robert,  King  of  Naples,  83  ; 
P.'s  admiration  for  him,  93-4  ; 
character,  94-5  ;  honours  P., 
95-6  ;  his  robe,  96,  98,  303  ; 
favours  the  Correggi,  102-3 

Roche,  Cardinal  Androuin  de  la, 
248 

Roger,  Pierre,  v.  Clement  VI, 
Gregory  XI 


Rome  :  P.  jealous  for  her  rights, 
28  ;  Lewis  of  IJavaria's  coro- 
nation and  retreat,  44 ;  I'.'s 
enthusiasm  for  Rome  and  Italy, 
his  view  of  the  continuity  of 
herhistory,his  political  idealism 
centred  in  her  supremacy,  73-4, 
122-5,  188-9,  I9i>  220-1,  226, 
270-8,  285-6 ;  P.'s  first  visit, 
77-9  ;  offers  the  laurel,  93  ;  P. 
accepts,  94  ;  his  coronation, 
97-101  ;  P.  made  a  citizen,  99  ; 
P.'s  third  visit,  iii  ;  Roman 
embassy  to  Clement  VI,  125-6; 
Rienzi's  revolution,  126-34  ; 
P.'s  last  visit  in  year  of  Jubilee, 
152  ;  Commission  of  Cardinals 
on  Roman  affairs  ;  P.'s  advice, 
169  ;  Charles  IV  crowned,  192  ; 
temporary  return  of  Papacy, 
276-83  ;  P.'s  answer  to  a 
Frenchman,  285-6 

Rossetti,  Domenico,  228,  272 

Rossi,  of  Parma,  66-7 

Sade,  Abb^  de,  36,  38,  177 

Sade,  Hugo  de,  36 

Sagramor    de    Pommi^res,    189, 

196-7 
Salisbury,  John  of,  100,  220,  306 
Salutati,  Coluccio,  150-1, 261,  262, 

267,  305 
San  Simpliciano,  213-14 
Scala,  Bartolommeo  della,  Bishop 

of  Verona,  88 
Scala,  Can  II,  della,  185,  190 
Scala,  Mastino  della,  66-7,  88-9, 

102-3 
Scandiano,  115 
Scipio  Africanus  the  Elder,  P.'s 

ideal  Roman  and  hero  of  his 

Africa,  90,  225 
Scott,  Michael,  265 
Secretaryship,  papal,  117,  170-1, 

203-4,  242 
Secretu»t,v.De  Contemptu  Mundi 
Selvapiana,  or  Silva  Plana,  104 
Seneca,  quoted,  73,  160 
Serico,    da,    or    Sete,    della,    v. 

Lombardo 
Settimo,    Guido :      P.'s    lifelong 

friend,   14 ;    his   companion  at 

home,  school,  and  University, 


3i8     PETRARCH    AND    HIS   TIMES 


14-20 ;  taken  with  P.  to  Vau- 
cluse,  17;  letters  to  him,  118, 
245,  246  ;  death,  281 

Sicily,  the  Two  Sicilies,  v. 
Naples 

Silius  Italicus,  225 

Simonides,  v.  Nelli 

Socrates  :  his  real  name  Lewis, 
47;  origin, character,andfriend- 
ship  with  P.,  47-8  ;  lives  with 
him  in  Cardinal  Colonna's 
house,  50 ;  visit  to  Cavaillon, 
120 ;  P.'s  letter  to  him  narrating 
deaths  of  friends,  144,  158; 
other  letters  to  him,  151,  156; 
quarrel  and  reconciliation  with 
Lttlius,  201-3  ;  the  Familiar 
Letters  dedicated  to  him,  216- 
17  ;  his  death  and  P.'s  grief, 
and  entry  on  the  Virgil  fly- 
leaf, 234-5 

Sonnets,  allusions  to  :  Chiare, 
fresche,  139  ;  //  successor^  63  ; 
Mille  piagge,  60 ;  Perch'  io, 
yy  ;  Per  mezzi^  60  ;  Per  mirar, 
29  ;  Quando  giunse,  ib.  ;  Vago 
augelletio,  139  ;  Vergognando, 
58-9  ;   Vinse  Annidal,  62 

Soranzio,  Raimondo,  32 

Sorgue,  source  of,  v.  Vaucluse 

Spirto  Gentil^  v.  Odes 

Statins  crowned  with  the  laurel, 
92 

Strada,  v.  Zanobi 

Style,  literary  :  P.'s  instinct  for  it, 
218  ;  his  demand  in  respect  of 
it,  228 

Sygerus,  Nicholas,  sends  P.  a  MS. 
of  Homer,  185-6 

Talleyrand,  Cardinal,  164,  173 
Tolomei,    Enea,    of  Siena ;    P.'s 
Latin   poetical   letter   to   him, 

53 

Travel :  P.'s  love  of  and  first 
tour,  43  ;  visits  Paris,  Flanders, 
and  the  Rhine,  58-60 ;  visits 
Rome,  77-9,  and  probably 
Morocco  and  the  English 
Channel,  79-80 

Tribune,  v.  Rienzi 

Triumphs,  v.  Canzoniere 

Tuscan  popular  poetry,  1 1 


Ubertino,  Don,  v.  Corvara 
Urban  V,  Pope  :  offered  P.  the 
papal  secretaryship,  204,  cf. 
242  ;  election  and  character, 
242  ;  believes  rumour  of  P.'s 
death  and  confers  his  benefices 
on  others,  250-1  ;  P.'s  admira- 
tion for  him,  ib.  ;  his  return  to 
Rome  and  back  again  to  Avig- 
non, 270-84  (chap.  XVII.)  pas- 
sim; P.'s  letters  to  him,  272-6, 
277-8  ;  invites  P.  to  Rome,  278, 
283  ;  death  and  funeral,  284 

Vallorabrosa,  Abbot  and  Abbey 
of,  156-8 

Varro ;  MSS.  copied  for  P.  by 
Boccaccio,  210 

Vaucluse  :  P.'s  first  visit,  17,  18  ; 
settles  there,  80-1  ;  life  and 
work  there,  8r,  82,  90,  109-10, 
117-20;  description  of,  1 18-19; 
the  last  sojourn,  156-76;  his 
bailiff's  wife,  159-61  ;  his  rude 
victual,  1 6 1-2  ;  his  house  and 
two  gardens,  162-4  \  his  bailiff's 
death  and  eulogy,  164-7  ;  his 
library  there,  165-6  ;  P.  leaves, 
returns,  and  leaves  again  for 
the  last  time,  174-6;  his  wish 
to  return  in  1362  frustrated,  236 

Venice  :  war  with  Genoa,  167-8  ; 
P.'s  letter  thereon,  ib. ;  victory 
and  defeat,  182-4  ;  P.'s  em- 
bassy, ib.  ;  sues  for  peace,  ib. ; 
visited  by  P.,  209 ;  P.  takes 
refuge  from  the  plague,  236  ; 
assigns  P.  a  house  in  return  for 
the  intended  reversion  of  his 
library,  241  ;  the  books  never 
claimed ;  real  origin  of  the  Mar- 
cian  library,  ib.  ;  Boccaccio's 
visit  to  P.,  242-3  ;  congenial  to 
P.,  246-7  ;  his  eulogy  of  her,  ib. ; 
Cretan  victory,  248-50 ;  four 
young  men's  judgment,  266 ; 
war  with  Padua,  291-2  ;  P.'s 
embassy,  ib. 

Ventoux,  Mont,  P.'s  ascent,  67-71 

Verme,  Luchino  del,  248-9 

Verona  {v.  also  Scala),  66,  115, 
116,  136,  156,  184-5,  190 

Vicenza,  155 


INDEX 


319 


Villafranca,  v.  Rinaklo 

Villani,  Giovanni  and  Matteo, 
54-5,  61,   123^4,   178,  214,  242 

Virgil  :  MS.  spared  by  I'ctracco, 
20 ;  the  Codex  of  the  Anibrosian 
Library  and  its  fly- leaf,  86-7  ; 
P.'s  poetical  letter  to  Virgil, 
136;  notes  on  the  fly-leaf,  137-8, 
233-5  ;  P-'s  belief  about  the 
Eclogues,  224 

Visconti,  the,  of  Milan  :  worst  of 
the  despots,  177  ;  their  relations 
withCharlesIV,  190, 192, 195-7  ; 
their  wars  with  their  neighbours 
and  with  the  Church,  195,  199, 
278-80 ;  denounced  by  Busso- 
lari,  198 

Visconti,  Azzo,  55 

Visconti,  Bernabo,  179,  184,  194, 

2C2 

Visconti,  Galeazzo:  saves  P.,  182  ; 
accession  to  power,  184  ;  sus- 
pected of  killing  his  brother, 
194  ;  engages  Pand.  Malatesta, 
ib. ;    instigates    P.'s    letter    to 


Bussolari,  199  ;  his  royal  alli- 
ances, 230,  279  ;  l^.'s  friendship 
and  visits,  247,  251,  259,  278-9; 
enslaves  Pavia  and  builds  castle, 
252 
Visconti,  Gian  -  Galeazzo,  pos- 
sessed P.'s  Virgil,  87  ;  married 
in  childhood,  230 ;  possessed 
many  of  P.'s  books,  242 
Visconti,  Giovanni,  Archbishop 
of  Milan  :  persuades  P.  to  settle 
in  Milan,  177-9  ;  his  character, 
ib.  ;  dominates  and  honours  P., 
180-2  ;  assumes  sovereignty 
over  Genoa,  183  ;  death,  184 
Visconti,    Luchino,    102-3,    144, 

178 
Visconti,  Marco,  P.'s  godson,  184 
Visconti,  Matteo,  184,  194 
Visconti,  Violante,  279-80 
Vita   Solitaria,  De,  v.   De   Vita 

Solitaria 
Viterbo,  276,  277 

Zanobi  da  Strada,  175,  192,  204 


PLYMOUTH 

WILLIAM    DRENDON    AND  SON,    LIMITED 

PRINTERS 


mmmlim^^^^^^^ 


^^  ooouii:^ao 


CENTRAL  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 


University  of  California,  San  Diego 

DATE  DUE 

MAR  lb  1373 

APR  02  1979 

l^iAY  15  19/9 

WW  ^1  19?9 

CI  39 

UCSD  Libr. 

